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Before going crazy paranoid over this tidbit, it would be worth knowing more about the Krokos, Wakil, et al trials. It is customary for those in the illegal drug import and wholesale business to employ competent criminal attorneys at trial, and one certainly would expect anyone in that business to know a fair amount about surveillance practice and related warrant requirements, and to question admissibility of such evidence if there was even a remote chance of getting it tossed.

The document to which the article links appears to be an application for continued and new cell surveillance of Krokos, Wakil, and a substantial number of others, containing a description of the probable cause, the scope, and the minimization procedures to be applied to screen out material unrelated to the specific investigation. It includes various references to applicable legal requirements. It is, in effect, an implicit statement that the DEA was playing fair, and of the agency policy.

Such techniques could, and doubtless will, be misused, and not only by police. Those in the business Agent Burkdoll's application described almost certainly have competitors who might be happy to supply their communication equipment. Police also might use compromised "secure" cell phones to lead them to other evidence and never try to offer the product of unwarranted phone surveillance as evidence, much like the DEA circumvented, or tried to, their use of NSA intelligence products in a number of cases. Finally, law enforcement agents sometimes will use techniques normally requiring a warrant completely outside law enforcement bounds; the NSA again provides an example in the form of employees sacked for using government time and facilities to check up on significant others, a kind of activity far from unknown in law enforcement circles as well. Unlawful use of surveillance techniques is nothing new, by either law enforcement or others. This new one is not different, and misuse will be dealt with in due course, as has been done in the past.