OIG Hotline, over the last several days, the FBI has appeared to allege that the daughters of my childhood minister -- Liz Herzog and Jenny Hoffman -- have been forced by the DoD to file knowingly falsified witness statements. Whether my minister friends, Chuck Hoffman and Ellendale McCallum Hoffman, have been forced to do the same, I don't know. The FBI has previously alleged that Peg Remsen may have been forced to do so, and potentially her husband Tony Remsen. All of these people, along with David Remsen, are part of the same family -- one to whom my family was exceptionally close while I was growing up.
Having said that, I knew Jenny Hoffman and Tony Remsen the least. Jenny was the little sister of my best friend, and there was too large an age gap for us to play together (approximately 5-6 years). And Tony Remsen was ultimately my best friend's stepfather, though out-of-state. So, we never had occasion to converse, even when he resided in my hometown. We were always cordial, however.
Liz Herzog, Chuck Hoffman, Ellendale McCallum Hoffman, Peg Remsen, and David Remsen are my friends -- wonderful people, with substantive integrity, kindness, intelligence, faith and warmth. These are truly good people, and they would never lie except under extreme duress. (I daresay that Jenny Hoffman and Tony Remsen are no doubt just as praiseworthy.)
I know the FBI hates ministers and clergy, so the agency probably punished Chuck and Ellendale to inordinate degree -- a fact which our whole nation should find devastating. The FBI did the same thing to my local minister Matt McDermott, taking his long-standing parish away from him and putting in his place a minister it can allegedly easily control, word for word, in the pulpit and out.
This constituted a spiritual crime it is difficult to quantify. The Reverend Matt McDermott refused to lie about me for FBI Station Chief Tom Lyons, even when Tom Lyons told him "Join or die." Because of his faith, character and integrity regarding this case, the Reverend Matt McDermott lost his entire church community.
Further, the FBI alleges that, despite the agency's financial compensation to the Reverend Matt McDermott, he has remained on their "target of interest" list, and suggests that the FBI has placed his entire family (wife, children, grandchildren, and twin brother) on this list as well.
The FBI also appears to allege that it has added my minister friend Lori Walton to its "target of interest" list -- again, for no reason whatsoever.
I remain deeply worried about these friends, and all of my other friends, who are wonderful people of honesty and good character as well.
My minister friends hold a special place in my heart, mind and soul, and to know the manner in which the FBI despises, harasses, surveils, defames and harms them is something I find entirely heartbreaking.
One favorite trick the FBI deploys is to email the whole congregation of a faith community by impersonating the online identity of the pastor, minister, priest, rabbi or imam. The FBI falsely alleges via email that a beloved faith leader is in distress and needs money from the congregation, and asks them to send gift cards via return email message.
By that point, the faith community is in chaos, with follow up emails clarifying the ruse for everyone -- but not before substantive monies have been sent in the form of gift cards from generous church goers!
Then the FBI tallies up the haul, and adds to their "target of interest" list every generous person who sent a gift card by falsely stating that they are supporting terrorism. Somehow the FBI alleges that the ruse was organized by a terrorist (all too true, but in the form of the agency itself!), and proceeds to implicate and target every kind person who attempted to help his or her minister in an allegedly difficult circumstance.
And, good people of the OIG Hotline, the agency does this over and over and over again -- to ALL the churches, ALL the synagogues, ALL the mosques -- multiple times.
Faithful Americans have no idea what is going on. None whatsoever.
And I find this absolutely heartbreaking, as I have said.
We were founded as one nation under God. That doesn't mean we all worship in the same way, according to the same rituals, at the same times. Some of us choose not to worship at all. But I believe that our founding as one nation under God was a statement of commitment to kindness toward our fellow man, benevolence toward the vulnerable, generosity of spirit toward our neighbors, altruism toward our countrymen.
The idea that the FBI should now be treating faith communities as ripe targets for scamming in this manner, with all the follow-on harms that are subsequently perpetrated against people of good faith, represents an abandonment of the very principles that brought us together and kept us together as a nation in our search for freedom and justice for all.
Does the fact that the FBI has contempt for God mean that Americans of substantive faith are doomed to be victimized by this agency?
Perhaps the American people would have a rejoinder to this predicament that we should now hear.
And perhaps the FBI might consider that, if God Himself is not a myth, He might find the agency's attacks on houses of worship to be as deeply offensive as the worst malevolent predation toward the vulnerable the agency has ever perpetrated anywhere, at any time, toward anyone.
I know I do.
I would further point out that our Constitution provides for the separation of Church and State in the First Amendment, a critical right that the FBI is now flagrantly violating. By cynically labeling the most thoughtful churchgoers "supporters of terrorism," the FBI has systematically breached all bounds of decency requiring respect for the sanctity and sovereignty of houses of worship across the United States.
Should we really allow Tom Lyons to turn our churches into casinos for this corrupt agency and its cohort? To turn our congregants into persecuted "targets," watched and harmed by the government for the sole crime of worshipping God?
Or can we muster the force of will as faithful Americans to say no? Emphatically and unwaveringly, no.
Most sincerely,
Lane MacWilliams
P.S. -- Please allow me to once again extend the disclaimer that some threats received by me and extended by the FBI are unsubstantiated by me at this time. I regret that I am unable to assess the credibility of every threat extended by this agency or its affiliates, and also that I am not in a position to judge the likelihood of manifestation. Having said that, many of the FBI's threats toward my family in the past have manifested in real-world harms. As a result, I believe that FBI threats extended to me must be viewed as potentially substantive.
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