The FBI really should come up with a warrant before poking around in financial or email records that belonged to Americans. But the Justice Department had argued that because the records related to internationally focused investigations, they didn’t deserve full constitutional protection. In legalese, national security letters were known as “administrative subpoenas.” Just like a regular subpoena, without the pesky need to convince an independent federal judge that it was necessary.
Even better—or worse, from the point of view of constitutional protections and privacy—the letters forbade the company that had received them from disclosing their existence to the target. In other words, the person being investigated didn’t even have a chance to respond.
Of course, real warrants worked the same way—telling a criminal target his house or business was about to be searched obviously didn’t make sense. Again, though, a judge had signed those warrants, after a law enforcement agency presented probable cause of a crime. That standard didn’t apply here. The FBI simply had to “certify” that what it was looking for might be “relevant.”
Regardless, the letters were constitutional, or so friendly federal judges had agreed. The bureau used them all the time. In truth, Rebecca could have persuaded the FBI lawyers who oversaw them to sign off on this one. By the standards of national security letters, the fact that a guy born in Russia had changed his name and funneled two million dollars to a National Security Agency employee was plenty.
Only problem was that Rebecca couldn’t ask. For the first time in her career, she was running an off-the-books investigation. Thus every word in the letter was correct, except one: authorized.
Still, she should be safe. The letter specifically prohibited anyone at Bank of Nevada from disclosing its existence. No one would ever find out. And as long as no one ever found out…
She wondered how many people she’d arrested had told themselves the same story.
* * *
The big blue Bank of Nevada logo gave the branch a slightly glitzy look. Maybe people here subconsciously associated money with casinos, needed a reason to stick cash in the bank.
Inside, though, the branch looked like any other. Rebecca flashed her identification to the woman behind the counter. “The manager, please.” The teller picked up her phone. An FBI badge carried even more weight in a bank than most places.
The manager was in her early thirties. She wore a trim gray suit, a less fancy version of Rebecca’s Theory set. Light makeup. A no-nonsense haircut. A bit younger than Rebecca expected. Rebecca didn’t know if her age would make her easier to impress or more likely to push back.
“Rebecca Unsworth.” She flashed her badge.
“Liz Crandall.” The manager looked around. “Is your partner outside?”
Smart question. Crandall knew FBI agents usually worked in pairs. Her willingness to question Rebecca from the first suggested she might not accept the letter on faith. Rebecca would need to take control of this conversation quickly.
“No partner. I’m here from D.C. Can we speak in private, Ms. Crandall?”
Crandall’s office was next to the entrance to the vault. No personal pictures, not even a motivational poster. All business.
Rebecca closed the door as they entered, pulled the letter from her briefcase. Making Crandall feel like a partner would be the play. “Don’t know if you’ve seen anything like this before. Most people haven’t. It’s called a national security letter. We use them when we’re investigating terrorism or espionage, targets with a non-US focus.”
“This is about terrorism?” Crandall’s voice rose slightly on the last word.
“I can’t tell you more than what’s in the letter. I will say if you call D.C., they’ll tell you I run the Russia counterintelligence desk.”
“Counterintelligence. Like spying?”
“Espionage, yes.”
Finally, Crandall seemed impressed. She took the letter, read it slowly. When she was done, Rebecca reached for it. Crandall hesitated.
“Shouldn’t I hold on to it?”
“Ms. Crandall, there are two ways to do this. You have every right to keep it, and in that case I expect you’ll want to send a copy to your headquarters, lawyers, et cetera. And Bank of Nevada has every right to contest this letter on behalf of Silver State. Though they’d probably want to hire outside counsel, as these are specialized cases. To be honest, I’m not even sure there’s a lawyer in Las Vegas who’s handled one. It’s an expensive process. Also slow. And this investigation is developing rapidly”—true enough—“which is why I’m here.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t follow.”
“A delay could harm the investigation. The other possibility, we simply look right now.”