(Ken Silva, Headline USA) The Justice Department’s Inspector General released a report Thursday, finding that an executive assistant with the Drug Enforcement Administration improperly leveraged a relationship with a confidential source to score tickets to sporting events.
“The OIG investigation substantiated the allegation that the DEA Executive Assistant had developed a prohibited relationship with a former DEA confidential source, in violation of DEA policy,” the DOJ IG said Thursday.
“The OIG investigation also found that the DEA Executive Assistant had used their position to cultivate the friendship, and then used the friendship to seek and obtain tickets to expensive sporting events, in violation of DEA policy and federal ethics regulations.”
The DOJ IG said it referred its findings to the DEA, which didn’t immediately respond to a media inquiry from this publication.
Improper relationships between feds and their informants have had deadly consequences in the past. The most prominent example of this comes from June 1989, when an FBI informant named Susan Smith was found dead in the Appalachians.
A lot of people watching the Showtime Waco/OKC series are disappointed with how ATF informant Carol Howe is being portrayed.
I believe the informant in the Showtime show more closely resembles another federal informant, Susan Smith, who was murdered by her FBI agent handler.
🧵 pic.twitter.com/GWcLmw5wFj— Ken Silva (@JD_Cashless) May 7, 2023
Smith’s death would be a cold case for about another year, until her handler, FBI agent Mark Putnam, confessed to murdering her. It turned out, Putnam had a sexual relationship with his informant, and he killed her to prevent his wife from discovering the affair.
Putnam became the first FBI agent to be convicted of homicide. His confession was made against the wishes of his superiors at the bureau.
He was sentenced to 16 years in prison, and he was released after 10 years due to good behavior.
One of the most recent sightings of him comes from several years ago, when he was pictured teaching an exercise class.
The story of Smith’s murder and Putnam’s confession is documented in the book Above Suspicion: An Undercover FBI Agent, an Illicit Affair, and a Murder of Passion. The book has also been made into a movie staring Emilia Clarke.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
