"This is a shameless and transparent attempt to prevent Special Agent Wright from telling the truth," said JW President Tom Fitton. "Incompetence and corruption on the part of the FBI has led directly to the deaths of innocent Americans. Robert Wright knows it, and his supervisors at the FBI know it too. Now it’s time the full story is told to the public."

JW began working with Special Agent Wright prior to the September 11 attacks in order to call attention to the bureau’s pathetic anti-terrorism efforts. Special Agent Wright was charged with investigating and launching criminal actions against those who finance terrorist activity. In fact, he is the only agent in the history of the FBI to have used the civil forfeiture laws to seize over $1.4 million in Hamas terrorist money in connection with a criminal investigation of terrorist money laundering operations here in the United States.

However, despite Special Agent Wright’s successful track record, supervisors at the FBI undermined his attempts to hold terrorists criminally responsible for their actions.

Furthermore, despite protests from Special Agent Wright and others, the FBI also sided with a Muslim agent who refused to tape sensitive conversations with a suspected Muslim terrorist because, in the words of the agent, "A Muslim does not record another Muslim."

When Special Agent Wright attempted to go public with the truth about these and other serious infractions with a tell-all manuscript, the FBI retaliated by launching investigations against him, suspending him, and by refusing to allow publication of the manuscript. Special Agent Wright then turned to Judicial Watch for support. After Judicial Watch launched a nationwide media campaign, Special Agent Wright was allowed to continue doing what he does best investigate terrorists. However, prompted by Judicial Watch’s press conference, the FBI is once again attempting to remove him from the Bureau.

Thanks in part to efforts on the part of Judicial Watch, Special Agent Wright has earned support from Members of Congress and the media. In a June 12 letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller, Senators Charles Grassley (R) and Patrick Leahy (D), both members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, wrote, "We are troubled by the FBI’s apparent haste to launch an OPR investigation every time an agent speaks publicly about problems within the FBI. This sort of knee-jerk reaction manifests an insecurity and weakness that is dangerous for such an important agency in the war on terrorism." The Senators demanded a briefing by appropriate agency officials.

Meanwhile, nationally syndicated columnist Robert Novak correctly noted that "Wright’s accusations go to the overriding question of whether the FBI can ever be reformed as an effective instrument in the war against terrorism." Novak also quipped that the FBI responded "like Pavlov’s dog," to Judicial Watch’s press conference by launching in secret its fourth investigation.

"If the FBI invested as much attention in prosecuting terrorists as they do in attacking loyal FBI agents, September 11 might never have happened," continued Fitton.

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