New York – The FBI was too slow to inform the New York Police Department that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects had spoken of attacking Times Square, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said.
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Federal investigators learned about the conversation during an interrogation of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in the hospital that began Sunday night and went into Monday morning, officials said. The information didn’t reach the NYPD until Wednesday night.
Kelly said he told the FBI that the delay was troubling.
“We did express our concerns over the lag,” Kelly said following a promotions ceremony.
Kelly and Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced the findings Thursday during a City Hall news conference.
“We thought it was important to put that information out because the people of New York City deserve to know that,” Kelly said.
Tsarnaev and his brother had been identified as suspects and were the target of a massive manhunt when, by his account, they discussed what to do with the remainder of the explosives used in the marathon attack, Kelly said. They came up with the idea of striking in Times Square, but Tsarnaev’s older brother was killed and he was captured before they could leave the area and do any more harm, New York City officials said.
Still, Rep. Peter King of New York has said the information was important because “there could be other conspirators out there and the city should have been alerted so it could go into its defensive mode.”
Asked what difference it would have made to have learned about the conversation sooner, Kelly responded: “I don’t want to speculate. The fact of the matter was there was a 48-hour lag.”
The FBI declined to comment on Friday.
At that point its no diffrence stop complaing !!!!!!
The FBI is useless, as it should have prevented this latest terrorist bombing, especially when the Russians warned the FBI, about the the older brother, and his Mother. In 2001, it refused to follow up on reports from field Agents, about suspicious Middle Eastern males taking flying lessons. Also, it failed to search the computer of the 20th hijacker already in custody, well before 9/11. If J. Edgar Hoover had still been around at that time, he would have cleaned house from top to bottom at the FBI. No matter what people thought about Hoover, he did not tolerate foulups by his Agents, and they were severely dealt with. On the other hand, it is high time that Robert Mueller of the FBI was retired. He was the head of the FBI on 9/11/01, and has already been in his post, well past the 10 year limit set by Congress. He should never have been given a two year extension. Fresh blood should be brought into the FBI, and a long overdue house cleaning should take place.
I find it unbelievable how very efficient the FBI worked so well hand in hand with Dweck in order to trap and catch more fish so they can make a big stink between the many Politicians and Yidden (most of them were clearly trapped into Dweck’s sweet-talking mouth and were never exposed to any wrongdoing before) but in a case like the Boston bombings they simply couldn’t get their acts together. It’s ironic!