Wiretap Report

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ContentsReport o the Director ............................................................................................................................................ .........5

Reporting Requirements o the Statute............................................................................................................................6

Regulations ................................................................................................................................... ..................................6

Summary and Analysis o Reports by Judges ..................................................................................................................7

Intercept Orders, Extensions, and Locations ................................................................................................................... 7Criminal Oenses .................................................................................................................................................. .........8

Summary o Analysis and Reports by Prosecuting Ocials ............................................................................................. 8

Lengths and Numbers o Intercepts .........................................................................................................................9

Costs o Intercepts ...................................................................................................................................................9

Methods o Surveillance .................................................................................................................................................9

Arrests and Convictions ................................................................................................................................... ......10

Summary o Reports or Years Ending December 31, 2000 Through 2010 ...................................................................10

Supplementary Reports ................................................................................................................................................11

Text Tables

Table 1

Jurisdictions with Statutes Authorizing the Interception

o Wire, Oral, or Electronic Communications ....................................................................................................... 12

Table 2

Intercept Orders Issued by Judges During Calendar Year 2010 ..............................................................................13

Table 3

Major Oenses or which Court-Authorized Intercepts Were Granted ..................................................................17

Table 4

Summary o Interceptions o Wire, Oral, or Electronic Communications ......................................................... .....20

Table 5

Average Cost per Order .........................................................................................................................................24Table 6

Types o Surveillance Used, Arrests, and Convictions

or Intercepts Installed ..........................................................................................................................................27

Table 7

Authorized Intercepts Granted Pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 2519 ................................................................................31

Table 8

Summary o Supplementary Reports or Intercepts

Terminated in Calendar Years 2001 Through 2009 ................................................................................................32

Table 9

Arrests and Convictions Resulting rom Intercepts Installed in

Calendar Years 2000 Through 2010 ....................................................................................................................... 37

Table 10Summary o Intercept Orders Issued by Federal Judges

January 1 Through December 31, 2010 .................................................................................................................38


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Appendix Tables

Table A-1: United States District Courts

Report by Judges................................................................................................................................................... 40

Table A-2: United States District Courts

Supplementary Report by Prosecutors ................................................................................................................ 106

Table B-1: State CourtsReport by Judges................................................................................................................................................. 130

Table B-2: State Courts

Supplementary Report by Prosecutors ................................................................................................................ 322


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Applications for Orders Authorizingor Approving the Interception of Wire, Oral,

or Electronic Communications

Reporting Requirements

o the StatuteEach ederal and state judge is required to le

a separate written report with the Director o the Ad-

ministrative Oce o the United States Courts (AO)

on each application or a court order authorizing the

interception o a wire, oral, or electronic communica-

tion (18 U.S.C. 2519(1)). The reports or all wiretap

orders must be submitted to the AO by January 31 o

the subsequent year ater expiration o the court order

(ater all extensions have expired) or ater the denial o

the application. The report must include the name o

the prosecuting ocial who applied or the order, thecriminal oense under investigation, the type o intercep-

tion device, the physical location o the device, and the

duration o the intercept.

Prosecuting ocials who applied or interception

orders, including the Attorney General o the United

States or his or her designee at the ederal level and any

prosecuting attorneys with statutory authority at the state

level, are required to submit reports to the AO by March

31 on all orders that expired during the previous calen-

dar year. These reports contain inormation related to the

cost o the intercept, the number o days the intercept

device was in operation, the total number o intercepts,

and the number o incriminating intercepts recorded.

Results o the interception orders such as arrests, trials,

convictions, and the number o motions to suppress evi-

dence are also noted in these reports. Neither the judges

reports nor the prosecuting ocials reports, however,

include the names, addresses, or phone numbers o par-

ties investigated. The AO is not authorized by statute to

collect this inormation.

This document tabulates the number o applica-

tions or interceptions that were granted or denied, as

reported by judges, as well as the number o authoriza-tions or which devices were installed, as reported by

prosecuting ocials. No statistics are collected on the

number o devices used in conjunction with each order.

This document does not refect interceptions regulated by

the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act o 1978 (FISA).

No report to the AO is needed when an order is

issued with the consent o one o the principal parties to

the communication. Also, no report to the AO is required

or the use o a pen register (a device attached to a tele-

phone line that records or decodes impulses identiying

the numbers dialed rom that line) unless the pen register

is used in conjunction with any wiretap devices whose

use must be recorded.

On May 27, 2010, Public Law 111-174 adjusted

the deadlines or the submission o wiretap reports.

Previously, 18 U.S.C. 2519(1) required ederal and

state judges to submit reports to the AO no later than

30 days ater the expiration o an approved order or the

denial o an order or a wiretap, and 18 U.S.C. 2519(2)

required prosecutors to submit inormation to the AO

no later than January on wiretap orders they had applied

or during the preceding calendar year. According to the

amended provisions o 18 U.S.C. 2519, judges must

now submit reports to the AO no later than January 31

on all wiretap orders they acted on during the previous

calendar year, and prosecutors must submit reports to

the AO on wiretap orders applied or during the previ-

ous calendar year no later than March 31. In addition,

the statute now provides that the Director o the AO shall

submit this annual report o wiretap activity to Congress

in June (previously, this report was due to Congress in

April).

Regulations

The Director o the AO is empowered to develop

and revise the reporting regulations and reporting orms

or collecting inormation on intercepts. Copies o the

regulations, the reporting orms, and the ederal wiretap

statute may be obtained by writing to the Administrative

Oce o the United States Courts, Statistics Division,

Washington, DC 20544.Table 1 reveals that 47 jurisdictions (the ederal

government, the District o Columbia, the Virgin Islands,

and 44 states) currently have laws that authorize courts

to issue orders permitting wire, oral, or electronic surveil-

lance. During 2010, a total o 26 jurisdictions reported

using at least one o these types o surveillance as an

investigative tool.


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Summary and Analysis oReports by Judges

Data on applications or wiretaps terminated dur-

ing calendar year 2010 appear in Appendix Tables A-1

(ederal) and B-1 (state). The reporting numbers used in

the appendix tables are reerence numbers assigned by

the AO; these numbers do not correspond to the autho-rization or application numbers used by the reporting

jurisdictions. The same AO-assigned reporting number is

required or any supplemental inormation submitted or

an intercept that appears in subsequent volumes o the

Wiretap Report.

The number o ederal and state wiretaps reported

in 2010 increased 34 percent. A total o 3,194 wiretaps

were reported as authorized in 2010, with 1,207 autho-

rized by ederal judges and 1,987 authorized by state

judges. One application was denied. Compared to the

numbers approved during 2009, the number o ap-plications reported as approved by ederal judges rose

82 percent in 2010, and the number o applications

approved by state judges increased 16 percent. These in-

creases were due, at least in part, to enhanced AO eorts

to ensure that ederal and state authorities were aware o

their reporting responsibilities under 18 U.S.C. 2519.

In August 2009, the AO revised the wiretap orm by

separating Part 1 (completed by judges) rom Part 2

(completed by ederal or state prosecutors) o the orm.

This enabled judges to submit Part 1 o the wiretap orm

independently o Part 2, thereby enhancing the accuracyo the AO reports. The impact o the orm revision was

refected to some degree in the2009 Wiretap Report, but

is refected more ully in this2010 Wiretap Report.

Wiretap applications in Caliornia, New York, and

New Jersey accounted or 68 percent o all applications

approved by state judges (see table below). In 2010, a to-

tal o 106 separate state jurisdictions (including counties,

cities, and judicial districts) submitted reports, compared

to 108 in 2009.

Intercept Orders, Extensions,and Locations

Table 2 presents the number o intercept orders

issued in each jurisdiction that provided reports, thenumber o extensions granted, the average lengths o

the original periods authorized and any extensions, the

total number o days in operation, and the locations o

the communications intercepted. Most state laws limit

the period o surveillance under an original order to 30

days. This period, however, can be lengthened by one or

more extensions i the authorizing judge determines that

additional time is justied.

During 2010, the average length o an original

authorization was 29 days, the same average length as in

2009. In total, 1,925 extensions were requested and au-thorized in 2010, an increase o 18 percent. The average

length o an extension was 29 days. For ederal intercepts

terminated in 2010, the longest intercept occurred in the

Southern District o Caliornia, where the original order

was extended six times to complete a 210-day wiretap

used in a narcotics investigation. A report or another

ederal wiretap that was submitted in 2010 or a previous

reporting period indicated that an order in the District o

Alaska was extended 330 days or a corruption inves-

tigation. The longest state wiretap, which was used in

a narcotics investigation conducted by Queens County,New York, was employed or a total o 559 days. The

second-longest state wiretap, which also was perormed

in Queens County, New York, was used in a corruption

investigation or a total o 540 days.

The most requently noted location in wiretap ap-

plications was portable device, a category that includes

States With Largest Numbers o Applications

Approved by State Judges

State Number of Applications Percent of Total

Caliornia 657 33

New York 480 24

New Jersey 215 11


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cellular telephones and digital pagers. In recent years,

the number o wiretaps involving xed locations has

declined as the use o mobile communications, includ-

ing text messaging rom cellular telephones, has become

increasingly widespread. In 2010, a total o 96 percent

(3,053 wiretaps) o all authorized wiretaps were desig-

nated as portable devices.

The Electronic Communications Privacy Acto 1986 (18 U.S.C. 2518(11)) and the Intelligence

Authorization Act o 1999 (18 U.S.C. 2518(11)(b))

provide that prosecutors, upon showing probable cause

to believe that the party being investigated is avoiding

intercepts at a particular site, may use relaxed specica-

tion or roving wiretaps to target specic persons by

using electronic devices at multiple locations rather than

a specic telephone or location. For 2010, one ederal

wiretap was designated as roving. Seventeen state autho-

rizations were approved as roving wiretaps.

Criminal Oenses

Drug oenses were the most prevalent type o

criminal oenses investigated using wiretaps. Homicide

was the second-most requently cited crime, ollowed

by racketeering. Table 3 indicates that 84 percent o all

applications or intercepts (2,675 wiretaps) in 2010 cited

illegal drugs as the most serious oense under investiga-

tion. Many applications or court orders revealed that

multiple criminal oenses were under investigation, but

Table 3 includes only the most serious criminal oense

listed on the application.

Many wiretaps were requested to conduct ederal

drug investigations in the Central District o Caliornia

(61 applications), the Southern District o Texas (51

applications), and the Northern District o Illinois (42

applications). On the state level, the largest numbers

o drug-related wiretaps were reported by Los Angeles

County o Caliornia (182 applications), Queens County

o New York (173 applications), and San BernardinoCounty o Caliornia (110 applications). Nationally,

homicide was specied as the most serious oense in 5

percent o applications; racketeering was specied in less

than 4 percent.

Summary o Analysis andReports by ProsecutingOfcials

Pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 2519(2), prosecuting o-

cials must submit reports to the AO no later than March

31 o each year or wiretaps terminated during the previ-

ous calendar year. Appendix Tables A-1 and B-1 contain

inormation rom all prosecutors reports submitted or

2010. Federal and state judges submitted 566 reports

and 267 reports, respectively, or which the AO received

no corresponding reports rom prosecuting ocials.

Table 10 shows the total number o intercept orders

authorized by ederal judges, by jurisdiction, through

December 31, 2010. For state authorizations, the entry

NP (no prosecutors report) appears in the appendix

tables. Some o the prosecutors reports were received


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too late to include in this document, and some prosecu-

tors delayed ling reports to avoid jeopardizing ongoing

investigations; inormation rom these reports should

appear in uture volumes o the Wiretap Report.

Lengths and Numbers oIntercepts

In 2010, installed wiretaps were in operation or an

average o 40 days, 2 days less than in 2009. The ederal

wiretap with the most intercepts occurred in the South-

ern District o Caliornia, where a narcotics investigation

involving cellular telephones resulted in the interception

o 74,715 messages over 210 days. The second-highest

number o intercepts stemmed rom a cellular telephone

wiretap in the Western District o Missouri or a narcot-

ics investigation; this wiretap was active or 118 days

and resulted in a total o 74,144 interceptions.

The state wiretap with the most intercepts was

conducted in Queens County, New York, where a

62-day wiretap in a corruption investigation involving

cell phone interceptions resulted in the interception

o 134,410 messages. A wiretap installed in Gwinnett

County, Georgia, lasted 415 days and generated 88,518cellular telephone and text message interceptions.

Public Law 106-197 amended 18 U.S.C. 2519(2)

(b) in 2001 to require that reporting should refect the

number o wiretap applications granted in which en-

cryption was encountered and whether such encryption

prevented law enorcement ocials rom obtaining the

plain text o the communications intercepted pursuant

to the court orders. In 2010, encryption was reported

during six state wiretaps, but did not prevent ocials

rom obtaining the plain text o the communications.

Costs o Intercepts

Table 5 provides a summary o expenses related to

wiretaps in 2010. The expenditures noted refect the cost

o installing intercept devices and monitoring commu-

nications or the 2,211 authorizations or which reports

included cost data. The average cost o intercept devices

in 2010 was $50,085, down 4 percent rom the average

cost in 2009. For ederal wiretaps or which expenses

were reported in 2010, the average cost was $63,566, a2 percent increase rom 2009. The cost o a state wiretap

ranged rom a low o $68 in Morris County, New Jersey,

to a high o $1,697,030 or a murder investigation in

Cape & Islands, Massachusetts.

Methods o Surveillance

The three major categories o surveillance are wire,

oral, and electronic communications. For many years,

nearly all intercepts involved telephone (wire) surveil-

lance, primarily communications made via conventional

telephone lines; the remainder involved microphone(oral) surveillance. A third category was added or

reporting electronic communications with the passage

o the Electronic Communications Privacy Act o 1986.

These communications usually are made through digital-

display paging devices, ax machines, text messaging,

and computer transmissions.

Table 6 presents the type o surveillance method

used or each intercept installed. The most common


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method reported was wire surveillance that used a tele-

phone (land line, cellular, cordless, or mobile). Telephone

wiretaps accounted or 97 percent (2,253 cases) o the

intercepts installed in 2010, the majority o them involv-

ing cellular telephones.

Arrests and Convictions

Data on individuals arrested and convicted as a re-

sult o interceptions reported as terminated are presented

in Table 6. As o December 31, 2010, a total o 4,711

persons had been arrested (up 4 percent rom 2009), and800 persons had been convicted (up 18 percent rom

2009). Federal wiretaps were responsible or 48 percent

o the arrests and 37 percent o the convictions arising

rom wiretaps or this period. The Southern District o

Florida reported the most arrests or a wiretap; a wiretap

used in a narcotics investigation in that district in 2010

yielded the arrest o 71 individuals with 35 convictions.

A narcotics investigation in the District o Connecticut

or 2009 resulted in the arrest o 52 individuals with 50

convictions. The table on page 11 presents the three state

wiretaps or which the most arrests were reported.

Federal and state prosecutors oten note the impor-

tance o wiretap surveillance in obtaining arrests and con-

victions. A wiretap in a ederal narcotics investigation in

the Northern District o Georgia uncovered incriminating

cellular telephone communications that led to the seizure

o $3,304,711 in cash, 48 kilos o cocaine, 60 pounds o

crystal methamphetamine, and 600 pounds o marijuana.

In the Western District o Kentucky, the reporting o-

cials stated that a narcotics investigation identied illegal

activity that resulted in the arrests o 22 individuals and

the seizure o $4,000,000 in cash, 13 vehicles, 16 re-

arms, 42 kilos o cocaine, and 3 pounds o marijuana. At

the state level, a wiretap in a murder investigation in Los

Angeles County, Caliornia, revealed a series o approxi-

mately 3 murders, 9 attempted murders, and 4 shootings

(11 separate incidents) involving members o a gang.

Several separate state jurisdictions reported that intercep-

tions were instrumental or identiying and investigating

sophisticated drug-tracking organizations that were

operating in the United States.

Summary o Reports or YearsEnding December 31, 2000Through 2010

Table 7 presents data on intercepts reported each

year rom 2000 to 2010. The number o authorized

intercept applications reported by year increased 168

percent between 2000 and 2010. The majority o thewiretaps have consistently been used or drug crime

investigations, which accounted or 75 percent o

intercepts in 2000 (894 applications) and 84 percent

(2,678 applications) in 2010. Table 9 presents the total

numbers o arrests and convictions resulting rom

intercepts terminated in calendar years 2000 through

2010.


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Supplementary Reports

Under 18 U.S.C. 2519(2), prosecuting ocials

must le supplementary reports on additional court or

police activity occurring as a result o intercepts reported

in prior years. Because many wiretap orders are related to

large-scale criminal investigations that cross county and

state boundaries, supplemental reports are necessary to

ulll reporting requirements. Arrests, trials, and convic-

tions resulting rom these interceptions oten do not

occur within the same year in which an intercept was

State Wiretaps Resulting in the Most Arrests

County and State Type of Offense Number of Arrests

Marion County, IN Narcotics 125

Queens, NY Narcotics 90

Queens, NY Narcotics 54

rst reported. Appendix Tables A-2 and B-2 provide

detailed data rom the supplementary reports submitted.

During 2010, a total o 2,852 arrests, 2,504

convictions, and additional costs o $39,259,171 arose

rom and were reported or wiretaps completed in

previous years. Seventy percent o the supplemental

reports o additional activity in 2010 involved wiretaps

terminated in 2009. Interceptions concluded in 2009 led

to 66 percent o arrests, 49 percent o convictions, and

82 percent o expenditures noted in the supplementary

reports.

Documents

Wiretap Report