FEATURED ARTICLES BY MICHAEL LEVINE

6/25/2014· Police Practices & Procedures

Reverse Sting Operations-The American Hustle: The Unethical Use of Reverse Sting Operations and the Creation of Crime

By: Michael Levine

Relying on data taken from 45 years of professional experience as a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) supervisory agent, U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) expert on undercover and informant handling procedures, trial consultant, expert witness, and police instructor, the author details the evolution of the Reverse Sting operation and its related informant-handling practices, from a once valuable and effective investigative tool to a headline grabbing scam that has severely damaged our system of justice by obliterating the entrapment defense and turning the Reverse Sting into a way to make money for criminal informants.

12/20/2013· Law Enforcement

Criminal Informants - A Tool For Entrapment

By: Michael Levine

"Gentlemen, in this business, you're only as good as your rats."-Lecture on the Handling of Criminal Informants (CIs) from U.S. Treasury Law Enforcement Academy, August, 1965

11/15/2013· Police Practices & Procedures

Fear & Deadly Force: Officer Involved Shootings

By: Michael Levine

The rules governing the use of deadly force by law enforcement are as easy to understand as the rules for three-card monte but about as difficult to apply as brain surgery.

10/29/2013· Police Practices & Procedures

The Weakest Link: The Dire Consequences of a Weak Link in the Informant Handling and Covert Operations Chain-of-Command

By: Michael Levine

Law enforcement agencies call them CIs (Cooperating Individuals, Confidential Informants, and/or Criminal Informants). Cops who use them call them stoolpigeons, stools, rats, chotas, etc. Intelligence agencies (Central Intelligence Agency [CIA], Defense Intelligence Agency [DIA], etc.) call them "assets" or the more confusing "agents."

7/8/2006· Expert Witnessing

Blind Mules—Fiction or Fact?

By: Michael Levine

On January 12, 2000, Gloria Cespedes-Cano and her teenaged daughter Sandra1 stepped through the doors of the LACSA (Costa Rican national airline) baggage department at John F. Kennedy International Airport and into a nightmare

8/25/2002· Police Practices & Procedures

Law Enforcement Experts - The Underused Defense Weapon

By: Michael Levine

During my 25-year career in Law Enforcement, working for four Federal law enforcement agencies - IRS Intelligence, BATF, Customs and DEA - I never lost a prosecution case. Here's the "secret" to my success