The ATF leader who oversaw a botched undercover operation in Milwaukee will now be in charge of the agency’s embattled Phoenix office, where agents allowed more than 2,000 guns to walk into the hands of suspected criminals through the infamous “Operation Fast and Furious.”

Bernard “B.J.” Zapor will be reunited in Phoenix with Fred Milanowski, another key figure in Milwaukee’s “Operation Fearless,” where a Journal Sentinel investigation found agents lost government guns, had their storefront ripped off and arrested at least four of the wrong people.

Zapor was in charge of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ St. Paul Field Division, which covers Wisconsin and three other states. In November, shortly after the Milwaukee sting was abruptly shut down, he was promoted to a position in Washington, D.C., supervising eight field divisions.

Officials from the ATF and the U.S. Department of Justice told congressional staffers in April that disciplinary action was under way against Zapor because of the Milwaukee operation. They won’t say if Zapor’s assignment to Phoenix is punishment.

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Robert Lustyik Jr.

Ex-FBI agent Robert Lustyik Jr. won’t be getting out federal prison in Utah any time soon.

The website Lohud.com reports that afederal appeals court in Utah has denied his request to get out of the fed prison pending trial on conspiracy charges. His freedom was revoked March 19 after a judge found he violated his bail conditions and had contact with a witness in his case.

An FBI agent was charged with using his position to try and derail a federal probe into a business partner, the Justice Department announced.

A federal grand jury in Salt Lake City charged Lustyik Jr., 51, of Sleepy Hollow, N.Y.; Michael L. Taylor, 51, of Harvard, Mass., the principal of Boston-based American International Security Corporation (AISC); and Johannes W. Thaler, 49, of New Fairfield, Conn., each with one count of conspiracy, eight counts of honest services wire fraud, one count of obstructing justice and one count of obstructing an agency proceeding.

At the time of his indictment, the Justice Department issued a statement by then Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer.

“According to the indictment, while active in the FBI, former Special Agent Lustyik used his position in an attempt to stave off the criminal investigation of a business partner with whom he was pursuing lucrative security and energy contracts,” said Assistant Attorney General Breuer in a statement. “He allegedly acted through a childhood friend to secure promises of cash, purported medical expenses and business proceeds in exchange for abusing his position as an FBI agent. The alleged conduct is outrageous, and we will do everything we can to ensure that justice is done in this case.”

To read more click here.

So much for holiness and disdain for the vices of the west.

CNN reports that in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks,  FBI agents surveilled U.S.-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki and found he was visiting prostitutes.

The network reports Al-Awlaki lived in a Washington suburb at the time and visited prostitutes at least seven times and paid up to $400 for sex.

The information was obtained through a Freedom of Information request by the Judicial Watch, a consevative watch-dog group.

Al-Awlaki was killed in 2011 in Yemen in a U.S. missile strike.

To read more click here. 

OTHER STORIES OF INTEREST

• ‘White House Down’: How the Secret Service Really Protects the President (Mother Nature Network)
• DEA: Walgreens Ignored Signs, Encouraged Questionable Sales Of Oxycodone At Florida Pharmacies (Consumerist)
• CIA whistleblower to Snowden: ‘Do not cooperate with the FBI’ (RT)
• What Doubling Border Patrol Agents Would Mean (ABC News)
• Audit: TSA Reviews of Private Airport Screening Flawed (USA Today)
• How Eric Holder Facilitated the Most Unjust Presidential Pardon in American History (Slate)
• Joint letter to Senate Judiciary Committee on confirmation hearing for James B. Comey  (Human Rights Watch)