Allan Lengel, editor of ticklethewire.com, is a veteran journalist who has covered law enforcement at major publications including the Washington Post and the Detroit News. He also served as an intern under the late investigative columnist Jack Anderson and was an adjunct journalism professor at the University of Maryland.
The Oklahoma Bombing 16 Years Later: We’re No Longer Surprised
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Sixteen years ago today, America was served up one horrific surprise: The bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City: 168 people died. It was shocker. At the time — April 19, 1995 – as a reporter at the Detroit News, I called around to federal law enforcement people,…
ATF Needs to Clean the Manure Off Its Boots
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com WASHINGTON — ATF has stepped into a big pile of manure and it hasn’t been doing a very good job of trying to clean off its boots. I’m referring to the dust up over Operation Fast and Furious , a program out of Arizona in which ATF let “straw purchasers” buy…
Is Chicago Fed Judge Going too Far to Protect Jurors?
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Imagine taxpayers spending millions of dollars collectively trying an Illinois governor, and in the end, the case all but collapses. The jurors only convict on one of 24 counts . They end up deadlocked on the rest. Imagine that. Yes,it’s not too hard, considering it happened in the first trial of…
Public Hearing on Anthrax May Be Inevitible
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com WASHINGTON – Though the FBI and Justice Department are thoroughly convinced that scientist Bruce Ivins mailed the deadly anthrax letters in 2001, it seems almost inevitable now that some very costly and protracted public hearing will be conducted to review the whole case. Unfortunately, Ivins killed himself in July 2008 before…
White House Needs to Stop Being Wimpy About Gun Rules Tied to Mexico
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com WASHINGTON – What’s it going to take for the White House to figure out that the situation in Mexico — endless bloodshed over money, drugs and power — is an “emergency”? The ambush of two ICE agents on Tuesday in which one died? The deadly ambush last March of a woman…