Boston station loses scoop after agreeing not to air story
* WBZ-TV heeded a government demand to delay a broadcast for national security reasons.
Joe Bergantino, a reporter for WBZ-TV's investigative team, was torn. He could risk breaking a story based on months of work investigating a software firm linked to terrorism, or heed the government's demand to hold the story for national security reasons.
In mid-June, Bergantino received a tip from a woman in New York who suspected that Ptech, a computer software company in Quincy, Mass., had ties to terrorists. Ptech specialized in developing software that manages information contained in computer networks.
Bergantino's investigation revealed that Ptech's clients included many federal governmental agencies, including the U.S. Army, the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Naval Air Command, Congress, the Department of Energy, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Internal Revenue Service, NATO, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Secret Service and even the White House.
"Ptech was doing business with every federal government in defense and had access to key government data," Bergantino said.
In mid-August, Bergantino worked with a counterintelligence think tank in Washington, D.C., to gather information. He gave the organization much of the information his team had collected. After reviewing the information, the organization thought that the government should be alerted about Ptech's ties to terrorism.
By the end of August, the Treasury Department launched an investigation based on the information gathered by WBZ-TV's investigative team.
Bergantino was ready to air the story by September, but the government had different plans.
Federal authorities told Bergantino not to air the story because it would jeopardize their investigation and would threaten national security. According to federal authorities, documents would be shredded and people would flee if we ran the story, Bergantino said.
But Bergantino claims the government's demand to hold off on the story was merely a pretext.
In October 2001, President George W. Bush signed an executive order freezing the assets of individuals linked to terrorism. According to Bergantino, the list identified Saudi Arabian businessman Yassin Al-Qadi as a key financial backer of Osama Bin Laden. As it turns out, Bergantino said, Al-Qadi also is the chief financier of Ptech.
The government failed to investigate Ptech in October 2001 and didn't start it's investigation until August 2002 when WBZ-TV's investigation called attention to Ptech.
Even if Ptech was unaware that the President's October 2001 order contained the name of its chief financier, documents seized in a March 2002 government raid revealed Ptech's connections with another organization linked to terrorism, Bergantino said. And again, the government failed to investigate Ptech.
The software company had an entire year to shred documents or flee so it was difficult to see how airing the story would jeopardize the government's investigation, Bergantino said.
When Bergantino pushed to air the story, the government became abusive.
"They said they would blame us if their investigation got botched," Bergantino said. "They said that they would ruin our reputation."
The government also promised Bergantino that if he held the story, he would have advance notice about the raid on Ptech. Instead, Bergantino said the government alerted an ABC News reporter, not WBZ, a CBS affiliate, to cover the raid.
"This is a good example of why requests for prior restraint must be examined very, very closely," Bergantino said. "It's not clear to me what difference our story would have made if it ran in September as planned."
When asked what journalists should do if faced with a similar demand not to air the report, Bergantino responded: "Very specific questions must be answered by a government agency that asks you to hold a story. You need very specific answers so then you can assess whether the answers are legitimate."
Bergantino doubted whether the situation posed legitimate national security risks.
"Their primary motive was not their investigation, their primary motive was that they didn't want the American public to see that they were behind the eight ball on this," Bergantino said. "This was an especially sensitive and embarrassing situation."
http://www.rcfp.org/news/2002/1213wbztvh.html
After March 20, 2002-Early 2003: Customs and FBI Battle to Control Finance Investigations
Larry Thompson. [Source: White House]Larry Thompson.
It appears that serious tensions develop between the FBI and Operation Greenquest investigators in the wake of the Greenquest raid on the SAAR network in March 2002 (see After March 20, 2002). The Customs Department launched Greenquest, an investigation into the financing of al-Qaeda and similar groups, weeks after 9/11. In June 2002, the Washington Post will headline an article, “Infighting Slows Hunt for Hidden Al Qaeda Assets.” [Washington Post, 6/18/2002]
With the creation of the new Department of Homeland Security in November 2002 , the FBI and its parent agency the Justice Department are given a chance to gain total control over Operation Greenquest. Newsweek reports, “Internally, FBI officials have derided Greenquest agents as a bunch of ‘cowboys’ whose actions have undermined more important, long-range FBI investigations into terrorist financing.” Meanwhile,
“The FBI-Justice move, pushed by [Justice Department] Criminal Division chief Michael Chertoff and Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson, has enraged Homeland Security officials... They accuse the [FBI] of sabotaging Greenquest investigations—by failing to turn over critical information to their agents—and trying to obscure a decade-long record of lethargy in which FBI offices failed to aggressively pursue terror-finance cases. ‘They [the FBI] won’t share anything with us,’ [says] a Homeland Security official. ‘Then they go to the White House and they accuse us of not sharing � If they can’t take it over, they want to kill it.’” This battle has a large effect on the investigation into Ptech, a Boston-based computer company with ties to suspected terrorist financiers. When Ptech whistleblowers [approach] the FBI, the FBI “apparently [do] little or nothing in response”(see Shortly After October 12, 2001; May-December 5, 2002). Then Greenquest launched an investigation in Ptech, which culminates in a raid on the Ptech offices in December 2002 (see December 5, 2002). “After getting wind of the Greenquest probe, the FBI stepped in and unsuccessfully tried to take control of the case. The result, sources say, has been something of a train wreck.” [Newsweek, 4/9/2003] Greenquest appears to have been heavily based on the pre-9/11 investigations of FBI agent Robert Wright. The New York Post will report in 2004, “After 9/11, Wright’s work was picked up by David Kane of the US Customs Service, who raided companies owned by [Yassin] al-Qadi, leading to al-Qadi’s designation as a ‘global terrorist’ and to money-laundering indictments of companies in Northern Virginia linked to al-Qadi and Soliman Biheiri (another Wright investigatee). The [Greenquest] indictments rely heavily on Wright’s work.” [New York Post, 7/14/2004]
The FBI will eventually win the battle with Homeland Security and Customs, and Greenquest will cease to exist at the end of June 2003 (see May 13-June 30, 2003). [Newsweek, 4/9/2003]
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/entity.jsp?id=1521846767-1114
Dubai port deal is nothing compared to Ptech
http://www.onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_570.shtml
Ptech Linked to al-Qaida?
15:03 PM Dec, 06, 2002
WASHINGTON -- A Massachusetts software company whose clients include the FBI, Air Force and Navy was searched by federal agents looking for links to a Saudi businessman who in turn is believed to be connected to al-Qaida, government officials said Friday.
...
No arrests were made but
agents did recover evidence from Ptech, which consented to the search. Officials declined to specify what was found.
...
Federal law enforcement officials say al-Qadi once was a key investor in Ptech, located in the Boston suburb of Quincy. They want to know whether al-Qadi still has a relationship with the company and whether information obtained in the search could lead them to other entities with which he was involved, a law enforcement official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Joseph Johnson, vice president of professional services at Ptech, said al-Qadi has no ties to the company now but "may have had something to do with it nine years ago" when the company started.
"There isn't anything going on here," Johnson said. "We're a small software company. What we do doesn't give us access to information that is top secret."
Ptech provides sophisticated financial tracking and budgeting software to big companies and to numerous government agencies, including the FBI, Energy Department, Air Force, Navy, NATO and the House.
...
"
The material has been reviewed by the appropriate government agencies and they have detected absolutely nothing in their reports to the White House that would lead to any concern," said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer.
http://www.wired.com/news/conflict/0,2100,56758,00.html