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    Ryan J. Reilly

    Ryan J. Reilly

    Senior Justice Reporter, HuffPost

  • Russian Operatives Drank Champagne, Said They 'Made America Great' After Trump Win

    A report from the GOP-led Senate Intelligence Committee says that Russian trolls celebrated success on election night 2016.

  • 'Domestic Terrorist' Christopher Hasson Pleads Guilty On Gun, Drug Charges

    The white nationalist Coast Guard lieutenant plotted to “murder innocent civilians on a scale rarely seen in this country," the feds said.

  • White Nationalist Coast Guard Lieutenant Likely To Plead Guilty In Domestic Terror Case

    The prosecution of Christopher Paul Hasson shows some of the challenges the FBI faces in prosecuting armed extremists allegedly plotting violence.

  • Why Did It Take A Federal Hate Crimes Charge To Get Rid Of This Racist Police Chief?

    Frank Nucera allegedly slammed a Black teen’s head on a door and regularly used racial slurs. His trial raises major questions about police oversight.

  • DOJ Axed Probe Of Trump Asking Ukraine President For 'Favor' On Joe Biden

    The Justice Department concluded "there was no campaign finance violation and that no further action was warranted.”

  • FBI Arrests U.S. Army Member Over Alleged Plot To Bomb News Network

    The soldier allegedly discussed traveling to Ukraine to join an extremist group.

  • Boston Police Captain's Estranged Son Reportedly Arrested In FBI Terror Sting

    A 23-year-old Massachusetts man who reportedly had a "history of mental illness" and was "obsessed with Islam" was arrested on July 4 after an FBI informant gave him weapons as part of a terrorism sting operation, federal authorities revealed this week. Alexander Ciccolo, also known as Ali Al Amriki, is the estranged son of a "respected Boston police captain," according to ABC News. The FBI was tipped off in the fall of 2014 by a close acquaintance of Ciccolo's that he “had a long history of mental illness” and had been "obsessed with Islam" for a year and a half, according to court documents.

  • Obama Frees Dozens Of Nonviolent Federal Inmates

    President Barack Obama announced Monday that he has granted dozens of federal inmates their freedom, as part of an effort to counteract draconian penalties handed out to nonviolent drug offenders in the past. The U.S. Justice Department prioritizes applications from inmates who are nonviolent, low-level offenders, have already served at least a decade in prison, and would have received a substantially lower sentence if convicted today, among other factors. "I am granting your application because you have demonstrated the potential to turn your life around," Obama wrote in a letter to the inmates.

  • The Obama Administration Is Still Hiding Gitmo Force-Feeding Videos, And A Judge Isn't Having It

    A federal judge who this week excoriated lawyers representing the Obama administration for their repeated attempts to delay the release of videos showing a Guantanamo detainee being force-fed ordered the federal government on Friday to complete redactions to the videos by the end of September. U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler issued her order a day after she laid into Justice Department lawyers in court for repeatedly delaying the process of redacting the videos. Sixteen news organizations are pushing for the videos to be released.

  • Background Check Flaw Let Dylann Roof Get His Gun, FBI Director Says

    Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old from South Carolina who is accused of killing nine people at a historic African-American church in Charleston last month, never should have been allowed to purchase a weapon, the head of the FBI said Friday. A flaw in the background check system operated by the FBI, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, didn't turn up a record of Roof admitting to drug possession, the FBI director told reporters, according to reports. “We are all sick this happened,” FBI Director James B. Comey said Friday, according to The New York Times.

  • FBI Director Still Unsure If White Supremacist's Charleston Attack Was Terrorism

    FBI Director James Comey said Thursday he's still not sure whether the killings of nine African-Americans inside a church in South Carolina last month meets the legal definition of terrorism. The FBI defines terrorism as "the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof in furtherance of political or social objectives.” Dylann Roof, 21, who is charged in the fatal shootings of nine people during a prayer service at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, apparently wrote a racist manifesto saying he wanted to "protect the White race" and had "no choice" but to kill innocent worshipers. "I chose Charleston because it is most historic city in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in the country.

  • If You're Trying To Join ISIS Through Twitter, The FBI Probably Knows About It

    Twitter has been "very cooperative" with FBI agents looking into individuals affiliated with the Islamic State and other terrorist organizations that use the social network to organize and inspire people within the U.S. to commit terrorist acts, FBI Director James Comey said Thursday. Comey said many terrorist recruits first interact with overseas terrorists on Twitter.

  • FBI Says It Disrupted Plans To Kill Americans Likely Over July 4th

    The FBI arrested more than 10 people over the past four to six weeks in an effort that Director James Comey said disrupted plans to kill people on American soil, likely in connection with the July 4th holiday. Comey told reporters at FBI headquarters on Thursday that all of the people arrested were connected in some way to the Islamic State. But not all of them were necessarily charged with terrorism-related offenses, he said.

  • Turns Out Obama Wasn't Targeting Porn, Guns, Gambling And Payday Loans After All

    A Justice Department investigation has cleared its consumer protection lawyers of Republican charges they engaged in a multi-agency conspiracy to shut down industries disfavored by the Obama administration, including online pornography and payday lending. The report did find, however, that Justice Department lawyers may not have believed online payday lending was a universally noble trade that always operated in the best interests of low-income clients. The report was requested by Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-Mo.), who, with Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), has led the GOP charge against a Justice Department program known as Operation Choke Point.

  • Baltimore Leadership 'Led Us Officers To Slaughter' During Freddie Gray Fallout: Report

    A Baltimore police union says officers were inadequately prepared for and poorly instructed during civil unrest following the April 27 funeral for Freddie Gray, an unarmed man who died in police custody earlier that month. Some officers didn't know who they were reporting to during the riots, according to a report released Wednesday by the Baltimore Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 3. The union "received many reports from members who were deployed to the defensive efforts, stating that they lacked basic riot equipment, training, and, as events unfolded, direction from leadership," according to the report.

  • Eric Holder: 'Act Of Terrorism' In Charleston Should Serve As A 'Wake-Up Call'

    The killing of nine members of a historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina, by a white supremacist was "clearly an act of terrorism" that should serve as a "wake-up call" to the American public about the domestic terror threat, former Attorney General Eric Holder told The Huffington Post on Tuesday. Holder said that based on what we know about 21-year-old Dylann Roof, who allegedly confessed to shooting and killing the members during a Bible study at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church on June 17, the incident should be considered terrorism.

  • Eric Holder: Edward Snowden Could Have Sparked 'Useful' Debate By Taking NSA Concerns To Congress

    Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden could have spurred a "useful" and necessary debate about government data collection if he had taken his concerns to members of Congress instead of giving documents to journalists, former Attorney General Eric Holder told The Huffington Post on Tuesday. Holder said in an interview with Yahoo's Michael Isikoff earlier this week that Snowden's disclosures had resulted in a "necessary debate” about the government's bulk data collection. On Tuesday, Holder told The Huffington Post that he believes the same discussion could have taken place if Snowden had taken his concerns to lawmakers.

  • Ferguson Prosecutor Accused Of Misconduct Is Still Doing Her Thing

    It’s late Tuesday morning, and perhaps 15 people are gathered in a room inside City Hall in this St. Louis suburb, a room that usually hosts meetings of the Ferguson City Council. Seated at the head of the dais, in the chair usually reserved for Ferguson Mayor James Knowles, is a man wearing a robe. Ferguson Municipal Court is in session.

  • Report: Intimidating Police Tactics In Ferguson Incited More Unrest

    The aggressive tactics with which various law enforcement agencies greeted protesters in the St. Louis region last August following the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, were deeply flawed and oppressive of citizens exercising their constitutional rights, according to a forthcoming report commissioned by the Justice Department. The so-called "after-action" report covers the police response to protests in and around Ferguson in the 17-day period following the death of Brown, 18, who was shot and killed by Darren Wilson, then a local police officer, on August 9, 2014. The Justice Department's Office of Community Orienting Policing Services (COPS), which undertook the project in early September, is preparing to release the full report, which is around 200 pages long, in the coming weeks.

  • Justices Breyer, Ginsburg Say It Is 'Highly Likely' The Death Penalty Is Unconstitutional

    Two liberals on the Supreme Court on Monday suggested that the death penalty itself may be unconstitutional, saying that it may violate the Eighth Amendment. Both Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg joined two other liberals on the court in the dissent that suggested that states would be able to burn prisoners at the stake under the majority's ruling on Oklahoma's use of lethal injection drugs.