A U.S. lawmaker is calling on the Obama administration to restrict how federal investigators use a controversial subpoena to obtain financial and other records, echoing a bill that U.S. officials have voiced support for. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) asked Attorney General Eric Holder in a letter last month to mandate that federal investigators keep a statement of facts for instances when they use the emergency subpoenas, known as national security letters (NSLs). Leahy also called on Holder to order audits of the letters and publicly report on the department's statistics of how the subpoenas are used. The March 17 letter,...
The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote on a Senate-approved bill that would pressure foreign financial institutions to disclose their U.S. clients and extend government subpoena powers of financial records.
A U.S. House of Representatives panel approved a measure Thursday that would impose an expiration date on the availability of emergency subpoenas used to obtain telephone and financial data.
The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill Thursday that would potentially discontinue use of a controversial emergency law enforcement subpoena by 2012.
The FBI has yet to resolve problems with how it uses special subpoena authorities granted under the Patriot Act, according to the U.S. Justice Department's Inspector General.
A federal judge ruled on Wednesday that certain sections of the USA Patriot Act are unconstitutional because they allow law enforcement agents to conduct searches and surveillance without showing probable cause.
Many bank employees can't differentiate between SAR-related and other information requests they receive from law enforcement agencies, regulators and other financial institutions. As a result, some hinder financial investigations by ignoring the requests.
print