Inspector General reports FBI failed to safeguard whistle-blower protections
The Office of the Inspector General issued the following four-page report moments ago;
Procedural Reform Recommendation for the Federal Bureau of Investigation
"During a recent investigation, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) determined that the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) training on whistleblower protections does not provide sufficient guidance to FBI supervisors and managers concerning identifying and responding to potential whistleblowing activity under 5 U.S.C. § 2303 (FBI Whistleblower Statute) and 28 C.F.R. Part 27 (FBI Whistleblower Regulations).
The Issue
As the result of an OIG investigation into a whistleblower retaliation complaint filed by an FBI employee in which we substantiated the retaliation claims, the OIG concluded that the training provided by the FBI to its supervisors and managers does not contain sufficient information concerning identifying protected disclosures and responding appropriately from a management perspective. We found that supervisory employees in several FBI offices failed to understand that allegations of wrongdoing by a subordinate employee were potential “protected disclosures” under whistleblower law. We also found that supervisory employees failed to respond appropriately to these protected disclosures because the supervisory employees took personnel actions against the employee for failing to follow the “chain of command” when the employee communicated directly with a high-level supervisor.
RECOMMENDATION
Based upon the foregoing, the OIG recommends that the FBI take steps to strengthen the training provided to its supervisors and managers to ensure that management employees recognize that: 1) communications by FBI employees to offices or officials outside of the chain of command may be protected disclosures under 5 U.S.C. § 2303; and 2) penalizing FBI employees for violating the chain of command when they are engaged in protected activity may be a violation of the law."
https://oig.justice.gov/reports/2018/o1801.pdf
The date of the above report is Dec. 12, 2017. It was released moments ago.
https://oig.justice.gov/hotline/whistleblower-protection.htm
The mission of Inspector General is to detect and deter waste, fraud, abuse, and misconduct in the Department of Justice.
The agency is headed by Michael Horowitz. He is pictured below:
Horowitz also released a second report today and is linked here:
