Steve Neavling

A sheriff’s deputy in Tennessee found himself on the wrong side of the law this week.

The Murfreesboro Post reports that Rutherford County Deputy Louis R. Parra-Flores, 36, was busted following an undercover drug investigation involving cocaine.

The DEA accuses Flores of attempting to deliver 7 kilograms of cocaine, the Post reported.

“The actions of a few corrupt law enforcement officers harms the reputation of the many dedicated men and women who wear the badge with honor,” said U.S. Attorney Jerry E. Martin.

Greg Stejskal

I was seated, facing Michael Lee Sprague as I interviewed him. We were on the same side of the table. As an FBI agent on the fugitive squad in the Detroit Division, I never liked having anything between me and the person I was interviewing. It was  easier to observe body language, and it didn’t  give the person being interviewed the psychological shield of having an object between them and me.

I was transfixed by Sprague’s eyes. He had just confessed to a double homicide, but his eyes revealed nothing. I knew the aphorism, “The eyes are the windows to the soul.” Sprague’s eyes were more like black holes – they didn’t reflect light they absorbed it.

But how did Sprague come to be arrested and interviewed by the FBI?

The story really begins in Jackson, Tennessee. Sprague was a drifter, and he had met Thomas Menth on the road. They had decided to travel together. In December, 1975, they picked up two gay professors from Bethel College which is near Jackson. They had all gone to a room at the Holiday Inn where Sprague and Menth overpowered the professors. They bound and gagged them, stabbed them multiple times and slit their throats – their throats weren’t just slit, the professors were nearly decapitated.

The murder scene was extremely bloody. When Sprague and Menth left the room, one of them put his hands covered with the victims’ blood on the wall near the light switch. This left impressions of several of his fingerprints from both hands. These prints were” identifiable,” but there was a problem.

There was a common myth at the time probably propagated by the movies and TV, that a fingerprint found at a crime scene could be matched with someone if their fingerprints were on record. The reality was, at the time, fingerprints were classified using all 10 fingers. The US central repository for all the fingerprint records was the FBI Identification Division in Washington, DC. (In 1924, J. Edgar Hoover, the Director of the FBI, was responsible for the establishment of a national repository for fingerprints.)

ice photo

When a person was arrested their inked prints were put on a fingerprint card which had pre-marked spaces for each finger. At the Identification Division, the card was classified by fingerprint examiners using the Henry classification system. Each fingerprint is unique like a snowflake. All fingerprints have common characteristics referred to by terms like loups, arches & whorls. Using these common features with their infinite variations, each of the fingerprints is classified with numbers and letters. These individual classifications are written in sequence determined by the order of the fingerprints on the card. The total sequence of all 10 fingers is the classification.

If an investigator were lucky enough to find an identifiable fingerprint at a crime scene, that is, one that was at least partially classifiable, the investigator could compare the single print to the fingerprints of a suspect. But only if a suspect was developed through investigation, a suspect could not be identified with just the found fingerprint.

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Steve Neavling

The FBI is investigating a rash of telephone bomb threats to buildings in 30 counties in Tennessee, Reuters reports.

Public facilities such as courthouses were shut down Tuesday following the threats.

“There were no devices found,” Dayla Qualls, spokeswoman for the state Department of Safety and Homeland Security, told Reuters.

Among the targets were the FBI and Criminal Justice Center in Memphis, both of which were evacuated.

Officials are trying to determine whether the bomb threats are tied to others around the country.

“We are working with the other divisions of the FBI in the other affected states to make a determination if there is a connection,” and if that is found the FBI will investigate any violations of federal law, said Joel Siskovic, spokesman for the FBI in Memphis.

Steve Neavling

 A Tennessee death row inmate has been denied access to FBI records that he says would overturn his 1998 conviction for the murder of a Memphis motel clerk, the Associated Press reports.

A federal appeals court reaffirmed the FBI’s right to redact information under the Freedom of Information Act.

The redacted records, inmate Michael Dale Rimmer argues, contain information from witnesses who said he was the wrong suspect, the AP reported.

But the FBI won its argument that the names of those witnesses aren’t important enough to trump the privacy rights of witnesses, the AP wrote.

Steve Neavling

The FBI is joining an investigation into an alleged terrorist threat in Nashville, News Channel 5 reports.

Amal Abdullahi, 29, was arrested last week on allegations she made terrorist threats to coworkers at CEVA Logistics, saying she was prepared to be a martyr for Allah and that nonbelievers should die, News Channel 5 reported.

According to interviews with coworkers, Abdullahi said nonbelievers should die and soon the country will be predominately Muslim.

After the company asked for charges to be filed, Abdullahi was jailed on a $50,000 bond, according to New Channel 5.

Stories of Other Interest

•  Czech Police to Get FBI Help in Fighting Corruption, Computer Crimes
• Feds: Florida Dumping Disable Kids in Nursing Homes for Elderly
• FBI: Infant Abductions Becoming ‘Violent Trend’
• Ceremony Planned for New Border Patrol Complex in Washington Peninsula

Could it be that someone has stolen Mitt Romney’s much-talked about tax records?

Politico reports that the Secret Service is looking into a claim by someone that they were able to get tax records from the accounting firm of Pricewaterhouse Coopers in Franklin, Tenn.

The person is demanding a $1 million ransom for the records, Politico reports.

The accounting firm issued a statement saying: “We are working with the Secret Service. At this time, there is no evidence of unauthorized access to our data.”

By Danny Fenster

The FBI is taking part in the investigation in what might be a series of hate crimes, reports WBIR.

The investigation revolves around the vandalism of three churches and a former church in West Knox County The FBI has joined in the investigation of vandalism at three churches and a vacant former church in West Knox County, Tennessee.

Two months’ worth of broken windows in the churches are considered violations of “civil rights” since the crimes occurred on “religious real property,” Special agent Richard Lambert told WBIR.

“That’s because Congress put it in the books that makes it a federal crime to damage any religious real property because of its religious character,” Lambert said.

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John Hinckley Jr. -abc news photo

When former President Jimmy Carter came to Nashville back in October 1980, a stalker followed him with the probable intent of shooting the president, according to recently released government documents.

“John Hinckley Jr. was in Nashville the same day (Oct. 9, 1980) Jimmy Carter was at Opryland Hotel and making appearances at other sites in our city,” confirmed Smyrna resident Darrell Long, who was one of the security officers who arrested Hinckley at Nashville International Airport. “But, we nor the FBI put it together that Hinckley was actually stalking President Carter. We had nothing to connect Hinckley with stalking Mr. Carter.”

Until recently, these historic facts have never before been made public.

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