Hal Turner took the stand today in his federal trial and accused the FBI of instructing him to make violent and racist statements. The North Bergen, New Jersey, radio talk show host is on trial for allegedly threatening three Chicago-based federal appeals court judges. In June of 2009, Turner said the judges “deserved to be killed” for a ruling they made in a gun control case. In more than two hours of testimony, Turner described how he was recruited in 2003 by the FBI’s Newark-based Joint Terrorism Task Force. He said he was paid “in excess of $100,000” by the FBI during his almost five years as an informant, according to The Record.
Turner’s first trial ended in deadlock back in December. A mistrial was declared after the jury deadlocked 9 to 3 in favor of acquitting Turner who was originally indicted in Illinois.
During the first trial, Assistant Special Agent in Charge Amy Pickett, the third highest ranking FBI Official in New York City, admitted that Turner was involved in “National Security Intelligence.”
On February 16, The Record reported federal prosecutors sought to bar Turner from revealing his longtime role as a FBI informant to a jury during the current trial. “Prosecutors want U.S. District Judge Donald Walter to preclude Turner’s lawyers from referring to his background as a confidential source for the FBI,” the newspaper reported.
According to research conducted by Alexandra Natapoff of Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, the FBI maintains an army of at least 15,000 “confidential informants,” while the DEA admits to having 4,000 snitches. “But the number of informants working directly for the Feds is probably only a tiny fraction of the entire stukachi [a Russian epithet used to describe a secret police informant] population, given the uncounted masses of snitches working for state and local police agencies,” writes William Norman Grigg of the Pro Libertate blog.
On March 2, two federal judges testified in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn that they feared for their lives after Turner posted the comments on his blog. “I read it as a threat to kill me,” testified U.S. Appeals Court Judge William Bauer.
However, neither judge asked the U.S. Marshal Service for special protection.
“The government’s case began to fall apart almost immediately when government witnesses confirmed Turner was a national security intelligence operative for the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force from 2003 through 2008,” the Family of Hal Turner blog noted on February 24. “Turner’s attorneys pointed out that the FBI itself ‘counseled’ Turner on the lawful use of violent rhetoric so he could flush out radicals before they committed acts of terrorism.”
The Family of Hal Turner blog, however, does not provide evidence of “radicals” bent on committing acts of terrorism in order to make its case. The FBI has a long track record of creating fake terror groups and urging easily conned patsies to plot harebrained terror attacks.
According to the MIAC report and the Department of Homeland Security’s “rightwing extremism” report, the government considers Ron Paul supporters, Libertarians, Constitutionalists, returning veterans, and Second Amendment advocates a threat. Both reports conflate the miniscule white supremacist movement with the larger and vastly more popular patriot movement.
In addition, the government considers the anti-war movement a threat. Responding to ACLU FOIA requests filed in 20 states on behalf of more than 150 organizations and individuals in 2006, the government released documents revealing monitoring and infiltration by the FBI and local law enforcement, targeting political, environmental, anti-war and faith-based groups.