FBI allowed its informants to commit more than 5,500 crimes in a single year - or over 15 times a day

Report reveals FBI informants committed 5,658 crimes in 2011

This is the first time this data has been publicly revealed

FBI numbers show a tiny fraction of government sources

No information available for other federal authorities such as the DEA

Startling documents reveal that the FBI permitted its informants to commit at least 5,658 crimes in just one year, or an average of over 15 incidents a day.

These new records, obtained by USA Today yesterday, provide a first public view of just how frequently the agency employs criminals to help with their inquiries. Yet this figure is just the tip of the iceberg.

The FBI's set of sources represents a small fraction of the huge amount of informers used by state and local government every year. No data is available on other federal authorities such as the DEA.



Nerve center: The J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington DC is headquarters for the FBI, and its network of informants

Vital: Joseph 'The Ear' Massino was the first official Mafia boss to cooperate with federal authorities in 2004. The Bonanno crime family boss agreed to wear a wire during conversations with his successor and implicated many of his former associates

'The million-dollar question is: How much crime is the government tolerating from its informants?' Alexandra Natapoff, a professor at Loyola Law School Los Angeles told USA Today.



'I'm sure that if we really knew that number, we would all be shocked,' she added.

This 2011 report, acquired by USA Today under the Freedom of Information Act, has been heavily redacted by the authorities.

As such, the document doesn't explain the type or severity of the crimes committed by agency informers, or how many incidents involved the sources without permission of the FBI.

The FBI has been required to submit these details to the Justice Department for over a decade, after the agency allowed James 'Whitey' Bulger to run a crime ring in exchange for information.

The agency has defended its actions in the past, saying that allowing its informers - who are often criminals - to commit offences is a necessary evil.



Law change: The FBI has been required to submit informer details to the Justice Department since the agency allowed James 'Whitey' Bulger (pictured center as his trial in July 2013) to run a crime ring in exchange for information.

'It sounds like a lot, but you have to keep it in context,' said Shawn Henry, who worked on FBI criminal investigations until he retired in 2012.



'This is not done in a vacuum. It's not done randomly. It's not taken lightly,' he continued.

An FBI spokeswoman declined to give more details. But USA Today reported that the agency had around 15,000 confidential sources in 2007.



There are strict rules, enforced by the Justice Department, on what FBI informers are allowed to do. Violent crime for example cannot be authorized by agents and must have federal approval first.

Yet a 2005 inspection concluded that the agency often broke these restrictions, as reported by USA Today.

'This is all being operated clandestinely. Congress doesn't even have the information,' Democrat Congressman Stephen Lynch told the paper.

Betrayal? In 2013, the FBI released documents that confirmed that noted photographer Ernest Withers served as a paid informant from 1958 to 1972. Withers reported on the activity of several Civil Rights leaders, including Martin Luther King, Jr

Lynch has also sponsored legislation that would make federal authorities report serious crimes committed by their informers.