Former NSA analyst and White House Secret Service officer found guilty in politically-motivated trial.

December 16, 2005 -- Former NSA analyst and White House Secret Service officer found guilty in politically-motivated trial. Yesterday, a chill blew across Washington, DC from the "Department of Pre Crime"- like U.S. Court House in Greenbelt, Maryland. However, the chill was not just a result of the icy weather that hit Washington yesterday afternoon but also a warning to anyone in the U.S. intelligence community who has not yet been purged from the ranks that they could now face prison if they dare contradict the Bush administration.

WMR earlier reported on the case of former NSA analyst Kenneth W. Ford who worked in the National Security Agency's Iraq shop in the Signals Intelligence Division between November 2002 and May 2003. Ford was found guilty of possessing classified material at his home and failing to tell the truth on a security form for a post-NSA civilian contractor job. As the verdict was read and Ford became emotionally distraught, four of the female jurors and the court clerk openly wept. The jury of 12 members and four alternates, made up of nine white females, three African-American females, three African-American males, and one white male, deliberated only four hours before reaching a guilty verdict.

Ford's name appeared as the author of an NSA intelligence report on intercepts of Iraqi communications that concluded, contrary to Bush administration claims, that there was no evidence to support the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Shortly after Ford left NSA for a job in the private sector in January 2004 he was confronted with a jaded FBI confidential informant planting two boxes of classified training material and other documents in his Waldorf, Maryland home. Evidence in the case clearly showed that the boxes had never left the custody of NSA, however, relying on perjured testimony by NSA Security personnel and FBI agents, US Assistant Attorney for Maryland David I. Salem contended that Ford drove his pickup truck in broad daylight to a highly-secured building at Fort Meade, Maryland and casually loaded two boxes in the back from an unguarded loading dock and drove off unchallenged. Furthermore, the government contended that a security camera located at the loading area was inoperative on the day the event supposedly occurred. Later, the government contended that Ford lied on a security questionnaire about prior arrests.

Because the trial was held in public, the government did not present the jury with details about Ford's job at NSA and his role in analyzing Iraqi communications. There is also evidence of possible jury intimidation, manipulation, and tampering. One of the jurors reportedly was employed by Northrop Grumman, the same company that employed Ford at the time of his arrest. That fact, alone, should have made the juror ineligible.

On the subject of jury tampering, today, Democratic leaders, including Senate Minority Leader harry Reid, accused President Bush of jury tampering by saying that ousted House Majority Leader Tom DeLay is innocent of money laundering charges. Reid said, "To have someone of his stature, the president of the United States, prejudge a case is something I've never seen before." Jury tampering appears to be endemic in the Bush administration.

In addition, Salem asked Judge Peter Messitte to jail Ford immediately upon conviction. Messitte, an international judicial and human rights specialist who speaks Spanish and Portuguese and who was nominated by President Clinton in 1993, denied Salem's request.

For WMR background on Ford case click here.

UPDATE: December 16, 2005 -- Evening Edition: WMR has discovered there is much more to the government's harassment of Kenneth W. Ford. Yolanda Gibson-Michaels, Ford's second cousin, to whom he is close, filed major fraud and conflict of interests charges against Donald E. Powell, the chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and a close political ally and friend of George W. Bush who served as President of First National Bank of Amarillo, Texas and Chairman of the Board of Regents of Texas A&M University.

Gibson-Michaels, a whistleblower who worked for the FDIC Legal Division, uncovered fraud involving senior FDIC officials and scandals involving Bank Hapoalim of Israel, Bank Leumi of Israel, Russian-Israeli mob figures Vladimir Guzinsky and Arkady Gaydamak (a financial partner of Cheney while he was at Halliburton), Bank Leumi's Chairman Eitan Raff, SunTrust Bank of Florida (the bank from where the FBI's confidential informant Tonya Tucker (who stung Ford) received checks while she was in the Washington area, the Washington Field Office of the FBI, illegal Congo diamond trading involving DRC Resources Corporation, massive overcharging of the FDIC by outside counsel law firms, Saudi lobbyists in Washington, the Wells Fargo-Tejas merger, Tyco International, Enron off shore entities, and Halliburton. WMR will bring more details about this massive fraud involving the FDIC, described as a $3 trillion slush fund for Bush, Cheney and their business friends and associates around the world.

Considering Ford's cousin's high profile FDIC investigation (also involving Securities and Exchange Commission probes) of politicians and businessmen connected to Bush, Cheney, and Israeli interests, perhaps David I. Salem, the U.S. Assistant Attorney who was so quick to see Kenneth Ford sent to prison, should also have any of his possible connections to the Bush White House, the GOP, and Israel thoroughly investigated for potential conflicts of interest and criminal conspiracy.

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