Former NSA analyst Ken Ford gets six years under questionable evidence

From today's Wayne Madsen Report:

March 31, 2006 -- In yesterday's sentencing hearing for former NSA analyst Ken Ford, Federal Judge Peter Messitte mentioned the defense's contention that the classified NSA documents Ford was accused of removing from NSA had been planted in Ford's home. Messitte also stated, "no one knows how he [Ford] ended up with these documents." Messitte also referred to Florida resident Tonya Tucker [one of many aliases], the government's confidential informant who initiated the sting against Ford, a "curious figure." Yet, even with such doubts about the case against Ford, Messitte sentenced Ford to six years in prison.

In fact, the prosecution engaged in gross and illegal misconduct for the duration of the trial and pre-trial. The prosecutor, Assistant US Attorney David Salem, relied on false affidavits, perjured testimony, and a tainted jury -- complete with a government plant who did not identify himself as a former employee of NSA contractor Northrop Grumman, and coached witnesses to get his conviction against Ford, the only U.S. intelligence employee who has been jailed as a result of his expressed doubts about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Ford prepared a May 2003 NSA signals intelligence report, based on intercepts of Iraqi communications and interviews with NSA counter-proliferation specialists, that disproved the Bush administration's theory about Iraqi WMDs. That report eventually ended up in Vice President Dick Cheney's office. The same type of retaliatory "work up" used on Ambassador Joe Wilson and his covert CIA wife was launched against Ford. However, as a young GS-9 and African American, Ford was much more vulnerable to being set up in a criminal sting than the more savvy and experienced members of the US Intelligence Community.

When Ford's defense attorney, Spencer Hecht, argued that former CIA Director John Deutch and Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger received very lenient sentences for the same crimes for which Ford was convicted, Salem defended their actions, stating, "they took the [classified] documents for the continuation of their work." Salem said that Deutch, who took home a classified CIA laptop computer and then connected it up to American On Line and reportedly surfed pornographic web sites and collected data transfer programs known as "cookies," remained as CIA director. He also said that Berger, who took classified documents from the National Archives, needed them for his testimony in Congress about the Millennium bombing plot. Salem also stated that Deutch and Berger continued to have security clearances when they took home classified documents. Deutch received a reprimand and Berger received a $10,000 fine and three years of probation.
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The prosecution's star witness "Tonya Tucker", according to a Washington Post story and extensive research on the part of Wayne Madsen, has been convicted of forgery, illegal use of a credit card, larceny and grand theft.

Also, former CIA director John Deutch was charged with similar crimes and never denied taking classified materials home and uploading them to a laptop designated for unclassified use. He was given a much less severe sentence. Ken Ford, who vehemently denied taking the classified docs, had less than a thousand pages of documents, Deutch was said have been in possession of over 17,000. [link to the Report of Investigation on Deutch] [U.S. Attorney's Office statement]