As Rodney King once said: “Can we all get along?” There has been a tradition of tension between the FBI and ATF. In Washington alone, there have been high-profile cases in which agents have from both agencies have had their differences. This report will only validate what’s already been reported, including a May 2008 report in the Washington Post.
By Devlin Barrett
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Agents of the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives are feuding over bomb investigations — racing each other to crime scenes, failing to share information and refusing to train together, according to a draft report obtained by The Associated Press.
The report says Justice Department bosses have repeatedly failed to fix the problem.
The Justice Department’s Inspector General, Glenn Fine, has drafted a preliminary report on the two agencies’ repeated squabbles to claim jurisdiction in investigations of explosives incidents across the country — from Times Square in New York City to Arizona and the West Coast.
The most recent documented spat came last December when the FBI protested a local prosecutor’s request to use the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives to investigate a blast that killed a state bomb technician and a police officer in Woodburn.
