Police chief quits over blunder

[BlueJessamine]

Source: BBC NEWS

Britain's top counter-terrorism officer has quit after admitting he could have jeopardised an operation which aimed to thwart a possible al-Qaeda terror plot.

Assistant Commissioner Bob Quick resigned after he accidently revealed a a secret document to photographers.

Police were forced to bring their operation forward and arrested 12 men - 10 of whom are Pakistanis.

Gordon Brown said Pakistan's government "had to do more" to root out the terrorist elements in its country.

Sources say the planned attack was to be "very soon" and "very, very big".
'Lives at risk'

BBC home affairs correspondent Daniel Sandford said sources close to the investigation had revealed the counter-terror operation had been launched in response to a possible terrorist plot that had reached its final stages of planning.




Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7991307.stm

[tomm2thumbs]

1. Britain’s Top Antiterror Officer Resigns Over Slip-Up

Source: NY Times

LONDON -- Britain’s most powerful counterterrorism officer resigned on Thursday, a day after being photographed carrying a document that outlined details of a major antiterrorism operation in northwest England and was clearly marked “Secret.” The officer, Assistant Commissioner Bob Quick of the Metropolitan Police Department, said: “I deeply regret the disruption caused to colleagues undertaking the operation.”

(snip)

The document contained names of antiterrorism officers and details about terrorist threats abroad, among other sensitive details, and was clearly visible to photographers with telephoto lenses. On Wednesday night, a judge barred the news media from revealing its contents.




Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/10/world/europe/10britain.html?_r=1&hp

---

I guess the NY Times isn't barred - they are showing the letter

[pfitz59]

2. Public domain

Guy screwed up. This is why God invented briefcases!

[Soylent Brice]

3. that is one CLASS ACT there. what a professional.

[MADem]

4. Jesus what a twit--INSIDE the folder, Gomer, INSIDE the folder!!! nt

[Ian David]

5. He's resigning to spend more time leaking intelligence with his family. n/t

[Ian David]

6. At least he didn't leave it on the train.

Secret intelligence dossier on al-Qa'eda 'left on commuter train' in latest data breach

Top secret documents containing the security services' latest intelligence on the al-Qa'eda terror network have been left on a commuter train, raising renewed fears over the Government's handling of sensitive data.

By Robert Winnett and Christopher Hope
Last Updated: 1:57AM BST 21 Jul 2008

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2112430/Secret-intelligence-dossier-on-al-Qaeda-left-on-commuter-train-in-latest-data-breach-say-reports.html

[ConcernedCanuk]

7. I wonder who paid him, and how much. I don't think this was an accident.

.
.
.

A photographer with a telephoto lens just "happened" to be handy

yup - I believe yah

oh - yeah, the check is in the mail

and so on . . .

[Coventina]

16. Seriously? You think photographers outside 10 Downing Street are unusual?

Wow.

on edit: verb agreement

[Uzybone]

8. Bush would have given him a medal

Its harsh, but appropriate that he resigned. Haven't you ever heard of a folder? Or a cover sheet? Or a damn briefcase?

[bemildred]

9. Sounds like bullshit to me. nt

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. You mean you don't believe it happened?

Or that he showed the document on purpose? Or that he shouldn't have needed to resign?

As this article points out, arresting people you think might be violent in daylight, in public places, puts the public at more risk than doing it in their homes in the middle of the night.

[bemildred]

11. I mean it sounds like bullshit.

The exact form of the bullshit is hard to tell. However, one can say that if this information was indeed precious, then one ought not be spreading it all over the news media in the way that is being done, regardless of the "mistake" that the gentleman in question did or did not make. And one can also say that the the British government is often quite draconian about preventing the spread of information via the news media, when it chooses to. There are laws.

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. The government did tell the media not to spread the information

The raids were brought forward after Mr Quick was pictured holding a white document bearing the word "secret". Pictures of him arriving at No 10 were broadcast on news channels and published on newspaper websites. The Ministry of Defence urgently issued a D-Notice designed to safeguard national security, which prevented media organisations revealing details of the documents. But by the time it was circulated the images had already made their way across the globe.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/police-chiefrsquos-leak-forces-terror-raid-1666119.html

As far as I know, no British media did reveal any details before the arrests (I don't think the resolution of published photographs would be sufficient to read it, without enlarging the original before publication). But it's not so easy to stop foreign media (the 'D-Notice' system, now actually called DA Notice, is voluntary, but an editor ignoring it would lose co-operation from the government, and also get a backlash from a lot of readers/viewers; that might not matter to a non-British editor). So they couldn't take the chance that someone, somewhere in the world, would both notice the details, and decide to publish them; they brought forward the arrests.

[bemildred]

13. Well, who can say for sure? I can't.

I live in the USA, where the government routinely leaks its own secrets for political purposes, brags about "secret meetings" its been part of, outs its own undercover agents for political reasons, etc. I can't help viewing this sort of thing with skepticism. The best of ways to spread disinformation is to have it released as a "damaging leak" and scurry around trying to remedy the "damage" done. But I don't know that its fake, and I don't have any more information than you or anyone else. I just find the whole story unconvincing, still.

[muriel_volestrangler]

14. I'm still not sure what you're unconvinced by

They would have arrested the suspects with or without the sight of the document that Quick was carrying; just that night rather than during the day. It was Quick who displayed the piece of paper, so it wasn't someone else outing him. I haven't actually heard of any details that were seen that wouldn't have been said freely after the arrest (perhaps there have been, but British media has kept quiet about them - is there more in non-British media?)

[bemildred]

15. That's OK. We can disagree.

I'm not really interesting in arguing the point. I just wanted to express my skepticism about this sort of thing. It's up to you to decide what you think.

Edit: I would add in a spirit similar to your post that I don't see why you care all that much about my skepticism about this story.

[NJCher]

17. anybody see Rachel's take on it last night?

It was funny. She said that we in the US have a different way of dealing with such incompetence. Then she showed a picture of George Tenet and said, "We award them the Congressional Medal of Freedom."


Cher