[National Review] And they won’t be solved by whining about criticism.What do you do with an FBI agent, sworn to uphold the law, who flagrantly violates the law in a rogue investigation aimed at making a name for himself by bringing down some high-profile targets?
Why . . . you promote him, of course. At least that is the way the Justice Department answered that question in the case of David Chaves, an FBI agent who serially and lawlessly leaked grand-jury information, wiretap evidence, and other sensitive investigative intelligence to the media in his quest to make an insider-trading case against some celebrities. And when finally called on it, the Justice Department circled the wagons: proceeding with its tainted prosecution, referring the now-retired Chaves for an internal investigation that has gone exactly nowhere after nearly two years, and using legal maneuvers to block the courts and the public from scrutinizing the scope of the misconduct.
The Ethos of Law Enforcement - It has become a refrain among defenders of the FBI and Justice Department that critics are trying to destroy these vital institutions. In point of fact, these agencies are doing yeoman’s work destroying themselves ‐ much to the chagrin of those of us who spent much of our professional lives proudly carrying out their mission.
The problem is not the existence of miscreants; they are an inevitable part of the human condition, from which no institution of any size will ever be immune. The challenge today is the ethos of law-enforcement. You see it in texts expressing disdain for lawmakers; in the above-it-all contempt for legislative oversight; in arrogant flouting of the Gang of Eight disclosure process for sensitive intelligence (because the FBI’s top-tier unilaterally decides when Bureau activities are "too sensitive" to discuss); in rogue threats to turn the government’s law-enforcement powers against Congress; and in the imperious self-perception of a would-be fourth branch of government, insulated from and unaccountable to the others ‐ including its actual executive-branch superiors.
Once law enforcement saw the virtue in self-policing, in a duty to expose and purge itself of rogue actors. Now, it tends toward not just burying bad behavior but ‐ the best defense being a good offense ‐ hiding it behind claims of a job well done, behind claims that its ends are so noble its means are justified no matter how unseemly.
In the years after the "Great Recession," progressives were frustrated by the incapacity of prosecutors to hold financial institutions responsible for the subprime-mortgage crisis and the housing crash, to which government policies had contributed mightily. One response was a flurry of securities-fraud investigations: If you can’t nail the evil banks, at least nail big-time market players, even if less than compelling evidence needs propping up by extravagant legal theories.
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