Paper Summary:

This paper discusses the various roles of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). It specifically focuses on the FBI witness protection program. The paper discusses some previous cases and then looks at how the FBI decides who is given immunity and protection and whether these decisions are being made properly or even should be made at all.

Table of Contents:
Introduction
Witness Protection
The Witness Protection Program
Analysis

From the Paper:

"Some people in the program itself have also raised complaints, stating that the government has not lived up to its agreement in some way or that the program itself is no longer needed in an era when the formerly powerful mob is no longer powerful: "Omerta, the mob law of silence, is long dead. With so many informants, targeting just one is pointless" (McShane, 2000, p. A1). The criminality of people like Sammy Gravano even while in the program has also been a point of contention, raising the question of how much the program is protecting questionable witnesses and not the public. The public questions the way the FBI and others decide whom to protect when people hear about cases like that of Boston mob hit man Joseph Barboza, who was aided by the FBI in 1971 to get him off of death row in California so he would not recant in a 1965 Massachusetts case that sent four innocent men to prison. He was aided when two FBI agents testified on his behalf. This has been deemed a cover-up that lasted more than thirty years. Two of the men wrongly sentenced died while in prison, while the other two were released after serving more than thirty years. The cover-p was discovered when the files of the two FBI agents who participated "revealed Barboza lied to the jury when he accused the four men of playing roles in the murder of the amateur boxer who offended Mob bosses" (Lawrence 2001, para. 13). Evidence has also been offered to show that Barboza killed several people while in the Witness Protection Program. Barboza himself was killed by a hitman in 1976."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Clark, R. (1970). Crime in America. New York: Simon and Schuster.
• Kessler, R. (2002). The Bureau: The secret history of the FBI. New York: St. Martin's Press.
• Lawrence, J.M. (2001, August 29). FBI aided killer - Hub FBI men helped Mob hit man escape death row. The Boston Herald . Retreived October 29, 2007 from http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-77665441.html.
• Lawrence, J.M. (2003, June 24). Thug's lawyers say FBI coerced witness. The Boston Herald. Retrieved October 29, 2007 from http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-104128330.html.
• McShane, L. (2000, January 2). With No Fear of Mafia Retribution, Informants Quit Witness Protection Program. Buffalo News (January 2, 2000), A1.

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