NCJ Number
191298
Date Published
1998
Length
25 pages
Annotation
This chapter focuses on trends for the future of domestic terrorism in the United States.
Abstract
The interactions between terrorist groups and those trying to prosecute them have led to a series of trends. First, in the post-Watergate era, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) operated under the “Levi Guidelines,” a set of rules limiting the extent to which the agency could be involved in internal security investigations. Terrorist groups successfully avoided capture by utilizing cellular structure and very limited recruiting efforts. The guidelines were revised in 1983, allowing the FBI greater flexibility and subsequently ending the generation of violent leftists from the 1960's and 1970's. Arrests of the extreme Right in 1985 led to successful investigations and prosecutions of scores of right-wing group members. The Federal Government passed the Extra-territorial Jurisdiction Act which expanded the FBI’s authority and jurisdiction to include acts of terrorism committed against U.S. citizens outside the usual jurisdictional boundaries of the United States. Recent Federal legislation has focused on the creation of terrorism-specific statutes. This approach marks a significant departure from the 1980's, when terrorists were prosecuted for traditional and conventional crimes. The greatest immediate threat from terrorist groups in the United States will probably come from violent fringes of the extreme Right. For these people, the new millennium has religious significance. The violent extremists of the Right are perfecting strategies to maintain an aboveground presence for recruiting purposes while developing an underground cellular network. Usually, symbolic catalysts propel extremist groups to violence for short periods of time. Critical to Federal efforts to minimize antigovernment violence on the right is to explore alternative intervention methods that minimize the potential creation of these symbolic catalysts. 5 notes, 6 tables