i am super small time and i had to talk to my bank two months ago and they informed me I was part of a SS investigation and I would be flagged by the state tax office. I was told it was due to Bodog(Bovada). Few people believed me since i play at such small stakes but it happened and i have tried warning everyone I know in home games to get out of online for now. With the secret service snooping around it can't be good for players.

Also the town i live in was invovled in a 2+ million dollar confiscation of funds from a processor a few months ago. A few of the bigger players in town were forced to help with the investigation by the SS.

yall shoulda had more bank accounts, not done tranfers over 10k per account per 30 days.

now if u live in a town where a processor went down thats probably a very unique situation

By talking to them, you are freely giving information that can be used against you.
If they would have read you your rights, then brought you to their office to ask you questions, would you have contacted a lawyer then?

There is no difference between either situation. You were detained. You were not free to go.

Really bad advice. Attempting to avoid bank reporting guidelines (even though your 10K figure doesn't even apply toward wires anyway) is a felony.

"Agent Jones, I'd prefer to speak to an attorney before speaking with you. If you would please give me your business card, I'll have the attorney give you a call." You don't need to tell them your nonexistent attorney's name or the fact that you don't have the money to hire one.

The agent will depart, and so what if an attorney never calls them? The agent knows perfectly well that 100% of attorneys will never let you say anything, even if the attorney is sitting in the chair next to you.

The worst they can do is arrest you, if they have a case against you. If they don't have a case against you, they now don't have the benefit of a statement from you (that could and would be used against you). If they do, they'll arrest you, you'll be entitled to a public defender, and they also don't have the benefit of a statement from you.

On the other hand, if you run on at the mouth, you have given them free evidence to use against you (and you have no idea how much if any evidence they already have). Nothing you could say can possibly help you (see video, Don't Talk to Cops, upthread).

OP apparently knew that the phone calls were far fetched and yet he included them in his story anyway. Makes it all the more believable imo.

I got a letter from the government the other day,
I opened and read it,
It said y'all were suckers

What were the agents names? Badge numbers? I have been apart of many, many government investigations (not related to poker, kiddie porn, or terrorism.) I have never once, not had the questioning officer show me his badge, give me his first and last name, and give me a card, with all this information on it, including a phone number I could reach him at, and an email address. If he didn't give you a card, and you didn't get his name and badge number, then that was your second biggest mistake, and you could even argue that it is an even bigger mistake than getting a lawyer. In fact, it probably is.

So until you come in here and produce some kind of credentials for said agent, that can be verified independently of this post, I suggest everyone takes this with a grain of salt.

Sorry, didn't see this post. So you say you have a phone number. Did he give you a card, or did you just write his number down on a napkin? If he gave you a card, please post his name and badge number, so someone can look into this further.

Former White-collar Corporate Attorney here, have dealt with the federal bureaus plenty of times, not sure if OP is true or not, but just a few things to add:

First, it is absolutely hilarious that anyone in this forum thinks they have any idea of how the SS, CIA, or FBI conduct their business, investigations, or interrogations. There is no one finer at those jobs than those individuals, and you'd have no idea what their means were even after you'd been slapped with a guilty verdict. Their interrogation skills are off the chart brilliant, they don't Barney Fife it up with the predictable good cop/bad cop routine. I've sat in rooms with clients as they are being questioned, it is absolutely stunning rhetoric, and it is always different. I can promise you, every thing they do is a calculated move that was planned months in advance. Every word they said was intended to be said, they don't wing it. Whether it was lies, truths, accusations, questions, humor, or scare tactics, they meant to say it, and they chose those words months in advance. The feds, they take all the time they want, because time isn't an issue for them, and because they don't lose. You will never see them coming, and you will never figure out where they are trying to go.

Outside of legal, there was only one time I had a brush with the SS. It was when I was standing on the side of a stage that President Bush was speaking on. A guy came up to me, and stood next to me for probably about 15 minutes and I thought nothing of it, he just looked like another guy in a suit. Then he spoke out without looking at me or moving at all. I didn't answer him because I didn't know he was talking to me. Then he repeated his question again, which was "What is your name and address?" I turned to look at him, and he turned to look at me. I said please identify yourself, he showed me his SS credential, and I told him my name and address. This didn't alarm me, because this SS line of questioning is standard for people who are within proximity of Presidential speeches, this is very common/routine. What stunned me, was what happened next: The guy proceeded to rattle off and ask me to affirm one-by-one a series of license plate numbers, models and makes, for my last 5 vehicles, my last 3 addresses, and a family member/relative work history and/or criminal history. I wasn't impressed until I realized two things: the first, was that I hadn't had an invitation to attend this event until about 45 minutes before it began, I myself didn't even know it was happening until then, and second the guy didn't have any ear pieces, and he had committed all of my license plates, addresses, family histories and criminal backgrounds of them to memory in that short of time. He was extremely polite, very systematic and non-aggressive with his questioning (compared to interrogations I'd seen), and at the very end seemed to break character, and his last words were "that SUV is a fantastic purchase, and I fully support the new renovation of your wife's school (which had been a controversial tax payer debate in our city)" and then he disappeared and I didn't see him again.

Second, please don't talk to law enforcement. Honestly, if the cop pulls you over and asks how fast you were going, you probably don't have to lawyer up. But Seriously, if the SS shows up at your door, lawyer up instantly. I don't care if they are asking about the neighbors missing cat. ASKING FOR AN ATTORNEY IS NOT RESISTING OR HASSLING THEM. IT IS YOUR RIGHT, AND THEY PLAN AHEAD OF TIME FOR YOU SAYING THAT. Hassling them would be cocking off or impeding the investigation. In those cases it is not going to end well for you. Also, its not fun for your attorney to find out that you were talking, and then decided oh no I should probably lawyer up after you've sunk the ship. What are you expecting your attorney to be able to do for you? In my entire career of dealing with pretty scumbag people, not once have I ever seen a single case where a guy was given a better shake because he decided to start talking. I do however, know of 3 different firm clients who are doing double digit federal prison sentences because of guilty verdicts fueled almost entirely from them talking before calling us. There was almost nothing we could do for them.

Lastly, there are all kinds of resources on the internet that you can educate yourself with. Use them to become more familiar. It's not so that you can defeat the police, but so that you can make better educated decisions regarding your best interests.

Stay safe and be smart

cool

I guess always doing paper checks and avoiding UB/absolute like the plague was the way to go after all. Go me

lol at anybody swallowing the OP

The local police or state police likely are not this good. However, the correct answer is the same. I invoke my right to remain silent ... I invoke my right to an attorney.

Speaking otherwise at all would generally be silly.

I don't live in the US but I don't see why this story couldn't be true. It's hardly inconceivable and the number of people outrightly dismissing it kind of surprises me. The post early on by Gambool makes sense in a number of ways and the post by hetero_flush kind of supports it as well

GFD I tried to kill the bug.........

Can you speculate on why the SS agent felt the need to impress you with his encyclopedic knowledge of your background? Obv. if they knew this much about you, they knew that you were a lawyer and (presumably) unlikely to engage in any funny business with respect to the president.

Man I'm glad I don't live in the USA. The bull**** you people have to deal with is unbelievable.

I'm quite glad I live in the USA. We have far more rights and protections than most nations. That's why we get so upset when anyone tries to infringe on them, as some authorities have tried recently. I also think stories like this on the internet are either completely fabricated and/or grossly exaggerated and/or mischaracterized due to bias.

We thought it might be for Rachel Banks.

Goodnight gentlemen...

I've been interviewed by the Secret Service/FBI and have former co-workers employed by both agencies.
I've also personally observed the questioning of witnesses/suspects by both agencies.


I've never observed in person (or in the media) a Secret Service agent on a Presidential protection detail not wearing a discreet earpiece during a public event. Ever. But you had to add that detail to make your fairy tale about a Secret Service agent with eidetic memory more dramatic.

Utter nonsense. They don't say stuff like that. It would be laughable if it wasn't so pathetic.


lol at anybody swallowing post #360.

Much of post 360 seems legit but the part about the agent showing off is weird. Maybe it happened but it is highly out of character. For 19 years, I worked in a law firm that represented a large law enforcement union (I was not (usually) directly involved in that representation); we infrequently had FBI and SS agents in our offices. They were very disciplined and very professional in their approach to all matters. They were also very secure and low keyed and did not "show off" to anyone. This incident description is not in keeping with what I saw of them or what I knew of their involvement in matters outside our office. But, maybe it happend, there's always an outlier.

The rest of the post about never talking is completely correct. I recall reading from time to time estimates of the percentage of prosecution cases that would have failed but for the defendant's voluntary incriminating statement and it was always very high, like 50%. The most common tactic is to get a defendant to make an voluntary "exculpatory" statement regarding some fact or transaction that the state has absolute proof is not true; then the defendant's credibility is shot.

Indeed. When a random person on the web comes out with an incredible, implausible story I think its safe to lean towards disbelief as standard.

i think you guys have passed some pretty messed up laws recently.

if "you guys" could pass the laws everything would be good I think, because im pretty sure in general american people have a very good idea of freedom. Unfortunately its a small group of people who live in their own world who do suggest and deside about this stuff. Im with george carlin on this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acLW1vFO-2Q