|
Changes
proposed for FBI WASHINGTON — Two senators called for sweeping changes in the FBI Thursday, including mandated lie detector tests of people working with sensitive information, letting Justice Department investigators independently look at the agency and protecting whistle-blowers. “We hope to have a better FBI as a result,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. A bill by Leahy, D-Vt., and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, includes proposals to make clear that the Justice Department’s inspector general has jurisdiction over the FBI, inclusion of FBI employees under the Federal Whistleblower Act, creation of an FBI internal security division and additional reporting requirements to Congress. “This bill and continued oversight work are about restoring law and order inside the FBI so that public confidence and public safety and security can be restored on the outside,” Grassley said. Under the senators’
proposals, FBI employees working with sensitive information would
be required to take periodic polygraph tests as they began doing
last summer. Leahy said lie detector tests aren’t perfect,
but one might have caught FBI spy Robert Hanssen. The FBI already has implemented some of the changes. Justice’s inspector general was given permission in July to start investigations of the bureau without needing the previously required permission of the attorney general, and a program was set up to administer periodic polygraphs to agents with access to sensitive information. “We are working with the committee. The FBI is a changing institution and this bill recognizes many of our new needs given recent events,” the FBI said Thursday. Leahy and Grassley also want to increase FBI security by starting career internal security officers, providing statutory authorization for the FBI’s police force and authorizing the Justice Department’s inspector general to independently investigate the FBI. |
|
|
TCU Daily Skiff © 2002 |
||