Law Enforcement Community Relies on the Information

¶ … law enforcement community relies on the information that can be obtained from reliable informants. But what problems and issues to law enforcement professionals encounter when using informants? This question and other issues regarding informants will be reviewed in this paper. Informants and Law Enforcement In the FBI Web site the government mentions that the courts have long recognized that the use of informants "…is lawful and often essential to the effectiveness of properly authorized law enforcement investigations" (FBI FAQ).

That said, the FBI goes on to warn that using informants to help an investigation is risky, and may "…involve an element of deception" or an "intrusion into the privacy of individuals, or cooperation with persons whose reliability and motivation may be open to question" (FBI). In other words, using information provided by a person that the FBI does not have one hundred percent certainty about, carries with it potential investigative hazards that perhaps should not always be taken.

Because of the dangers linked to informants, the FBI's Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) reports that "special care is taken to carefully evaluate and closely supervise" the use of informants. The Attorney General of the U.S. issues specific guidelines to the FBI that limit the use of informants to certain criteria, the FBI's FAQ page explains.

Are informants ever hired as employees of the FBI? No, the FBI asserts, they are not hired or trained by the FBI but they "may receive compensation in some instances for their information and expenses." This means that if an informant has a high degree of veracity, and provides valuable information to the FBI, he or she could be paid. It's not unusual for the Department of Defense (DOD) to hand out suitcases full of cash (millions of dollars) in the hopes of gaining information on terrorists.

As a classic example of money the CIA (in coordination with the DOD) uses to lure informants into collaboration with American forces, the U.S. "has offered rewards of up to $5 million for information leading to the location of [Taliban leader] Hakimullah Mehsud" (The Citizen). It can backfire on the U.S., and indeed a Taliban "informant" took money from the U.S. But it turned out he was an "…informant-turned-suicide bomber who killed five CIA officers and two CIA security contractors" in 2010 (The Citizen).

As for police departments and their approaches to informants within the U.S., an article in Law Officer points to "key elements in establishing informant reliability" (Jetmore, 2007).

The following steps should be taken by investigators prior to accepting the veracity of a potential informant -- in order to "achieve the totality of circumstances and thus probably cause": a) "corroborate as much of the informants' information as possible"; b) try to determine "how, where, when and under what circumstances" this informant actually acquired the needed information; c) explain, while avoiding specific cases and names, how the use of informants in past criminal cases.