9/11 Law Enforcement Privacy

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'~::::' •.........•............. MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD

\\ \\\li~en;:1 IspeCial Agent. Miami Field Office

Type'of Event: Interview

·~.~te: October 3, 2003

Sp~ial Access.~~sues: None

Prepat~d by: Peter~undlet

Team nu~.~er: 6 ..

Location: .F~~3I, Miami Fie1d..Office

..\.... -.
\ Participants Non-Commission+Sean O'Neill, Associate General Counsel, FBI

~articipants - CJip.mission:· Caro;irie Bames and Peter Rundlet

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" BaCkgrOun·~J .~in~d.t!1e Army in 1980 and stayed in it until 1990 .
He 'served as part oft~e FIfth SpecIal Forces 'Group at Ft. Bragg in North Carolina. He
. became a First Class Intelligence Sergeant andhe traveled to Africa and the Middle East.
\ He was trained in Urdu (to level 2) and Arabic (to.level 1) for about a year in each
\. language. He went to Pakistan under the auspices d{ the United Nations where he trained
\.Pakistanis to do de-mining. After he left the Army, he..sold paint for Sears starting in
\April 1\990, and he went back to school full-time. In January 1991, he was called up from
the Res~ the Gulf War, but stayed in Washington, 'n.c. for 6 months to study
Arabic. L-.tompleted his B.S. in Business from Methodist College in Fayetteville, .
North Carolina in "1992 or 1993." After that, he was alternated. between being
unemployed and working temporary jobs at Ft. Bragg for the Department of Defense. He
worked some in the Airborne Test Directorate testing the C-17 Glohemaster cargo
aircraft for Army and Marine Corps use. He coordinated 8 of 12 sublets on this project.
He\did this for two years. After that he worked at Wachovia Bank for nine months as a
Supervisor in their Operations Facility in Charlotte, NC. During this time, ..he was
working on his M.A. in Political Science from Fayetteville State University] ..__ .....
applied for a position as an Agent with the FBI and heard nothing for two years. He
finally got a call in 1996, went through the application process and finally started with the
Bure~~ on September, 28, 1997. After Quantico, he came to Miami on January 22, 1998.

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initially worked with squad C-3 - the Violent Crimes Fugitive Task Force,

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looking for fugitives. He accomplished 19 arrests and assisted in 49 other arrests. He
also worked warrants and affidavits .
 9/11 Classified Information

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\\:, ..
Initial IT Work, Lack of Focus by Management. In May, 199~J I
transferred to NS-3, which is now T -1. He said that he asked to work IT'{intemational
terrorism) matters because of his background and language training. tI'~ was tasked to
work on Usama Bi : y agent working
on this at that time e said he was
"dumped" with this case - It a een open or lye years., aid that, at that time,
the FBI was not concerned about the content ofFISAs, Qut rather just the stat created by
having the FISA. [!! 1 ,,,,,: .:

The FBI in general was not interested in IT ....<H:esaid it was not a big priority and
: \, \" that there was a "rinky dink" squad. "We were overwhelmed with work. I was
\ """disappointed. We were inundated with UBL leads." ,:there were so many foreigners
coming i~ and there wer~~h
\\ ........ people th~:squa~ and those that were there were ~n'
\ I~ot :xrnenced enough, aid that senior agents did no see IT as a career path.
\. \. said that the squa was run byos-us
a,nd GS-12s. Senior agents didn't want to
!\ ~ t IS work. He said ...that there were 6-~:itge~ts on the squad, none senior.

.. \ \
!
He said -c
Iwas.. .~~:ervisor and he "rubbed pe~~~
w~)\people di?n:,~:.thn~khe was qu~Hfi~(ffor the '~b<,~~d
ili:
th~ It-s-...., ..
. , despised and viewed him as "a weasel.". al~'t~'h~d a ue \IWIW~...w.......,.;&.,.
\! ass" and that he.was "a climber. ",
t
eft Miami on"May 9, 200'1 to take.
eny
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jobat Headquarters (HQ).. · ..Ill t at Foreign .:Counterin,t.ellig {FcnJ-l"""!t l~e-as-t-'"
!\ had 4 real program, "W<;:'oa ,:trap/ No training. "Miami got-shut out." aulted
!\ f,aiIllJf:s' ..
!They kneW we'li,ext: Qlrc6yb~Jmed"; lIe "aid tha' HQ
n:ana~e~enrfor these
! \ did not cooperate on ~.JS1\S'._ 9/11 Classl.hed Info;matl.on 1
! \2002 /w
\ '\ ~6~ tfi~;.:i~uad unti1~~as
IC ". was,..the,:~e~#bom leadssquad,
inY6i~taq~"~~ved
H6' said
to NS-6 on May 11,
Jh;tl
Idid not want the
f \. \. ~/ st~y ,~hh the ~q~~d and ~91 1~!Jokt e case with him to NS-6.
! ./ ,I'::': \ "''1.< .::~:. /::/ ,'", ",I' ,;::;' :,#', ..
"...., ..

! :/...:/,
9/t.~ ,;rn..4::I~inedi~te ~fter~~tb. Rightafter 9/11, management pulled everyone
! off$e rna': r c;il.s,~·s'
to workthe
Penttbom.leads, They took all the junior agents to work
/ these. ~d that-they should h~v~'used NS-3 to do liaison with case agents.
j :", ,:alr!!!~t
~~~o,.()nl~~g'~he cases;. th.e bac~do~r was open." He said they
/ / )U~ ~ro~p.~
... .... t1---...Js'~ld It was a big investigation run by GS-lls and12s
! :/::RnP tnat.-h~fdid 116,P~hinklhi&,was right. He said the senior agents were "shagging leads"
...
f .../ :::/ ~d:,t~lJUDior~et:l¥.we~~:~o~sulting management about the case.

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!
///"/;:f .'_~;~i(
:/:/.,""/~sS1stant'Spec~a:l>l\ge~t In Charge (ASA.C-
Iwas the SAC
'aId that management lost confidence
.~dl ~as the

j :/'/:: ....""/<.::~~:fooved ~.m (t? becometh . "so they put ~othe~

! i/',"" /'/~;:~~i~e,xp~n~~e~d'ASACIn ....the 191?;.: ' id say that the 9111 plot was investigated
! !/....
:/'>//:tJio(o~g1)iy~'
though: "W~:9i~~over It. It was just a bad personnel decision."

~_{::;~:~:-:<>':'biJg~~~~~id not wr on ~e Penttbom l~ad the wh.ole tin;e because he

!je:::: ::::;;;;;;;;:ii;;;iiii/....
._::::::/'/~/>,')yas tP~ack to wor He said that they didn't use him dunng Penttbom

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s~ee~
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9/11 Law Enforcement Privacy
9/11 Law Enforcement Privacy

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'•... ~\ \\ ~-,~.~.. .• ':, r WOrk-\;~~yfj(rugrj'~~:-"r:2' ""'>' guy. He said they put a junior agent
, ""'\""', ' :QPPenttbom: aid -v , . adworked the Ken a embassy
\. "''',
.\.., \-. born ung be ore, bllt:~~ly as a liaison -- he een an"ALAT~ . as "a nice guy,
\. \.,"\" -"-., but notexperienced ininvestigation. He was in Africa for two years." aid he
\~,~ the On.t~ agent on UBL-:iin4:~1-Garnat before then.
\\ ""'\.':\::;.,

\.\ \\..,':::::'\,\\, :eSPi 1d

~hortcomi~~J~~-laid that he could supervise. He said that
\, \" --I \, Jtook over and~sn~)acked the knowledge and skills to be
'. \, l~ad. S~ was Actmg Supervisor ofNS-3/f-l and-came in as a GS-12. She had never
\"taken anything to trial and she was managing the Penttbom investigation in the Miami
"office. \, <. ... ,.,

\\ \\ His 'P,re-9111 Work (FISAslInfo Sharing). Prior to 9/11r--lhad gone to

Middlebury College for 9 months; he obtained a level 2 (presuma~~ old Foreign
Service Language 5 point scale) in Modern Standard Arabic. He said that when 9/11
\".,happ',~ne,~,they ne~~r consulted him for anything.
\\ ",', said ~'hatthe have a lar e Arab/Muslim population in Miami....I I
\, "We couldn't get him into Alien Terrorist
.... -- ........... e-c-au-s-e""'l!\""'lt~w-as~to-O
""""'l"I'I ..... ......l.,.,..lC-U.",:t to declassi the work." Attotne
ursue a case there.

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9/11 Classified Information

I Iw~\~oVed to Nsi"(~hiCh ~orks Penttbom leads ~.;y) on May 11,2002

and no on consulted \yith him or gave him notice or reason. He just received an Ee that
said "you're moving. '1
Isaid thatgenerally, when an age!)' moves. the agent
transfers his or her cases, so he transferred of his cases exc~4 all IHe said that
it is a lot of work keeping the FISA going'J ~aid that hestarted the process for a
new FISA on an imam I .
Iwhe9 he was with N .~J. He said that he was told
to keep both FISAs when he was transferred.

9/11 Classified Information

Analysis. H

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