Manufacturing Criminals: Fourth Amendment Decay in the Electronic Age

by Bonnie Burkhardt

Overview

This documentary exposes Fourth Amendment violations by ICAC (Internet Crimes Against
Children Task Force). The police organization ICAC uses tactics which directly violate the interception
and privacy laws derived from our Fourth Amendment. ICAC originated in Virginia, but is now a
nationwide organization.

I wrote two amicus briefs with appendices as a pro se litigant and filed them with
the Appellate Court of Virginia describing these tactics:
1. Officers claim to be a child and impersonate someone else to intercept communications
– without Court authorization.
2. Officers use special tools over the internet to secretly break into private computers and search them
- without a warrant.
3. Officers unmask the identity of anonymous online users and geo-locate them
- without a warrant.
4. The ICAC Cops Database inventories and tracks content of people's private computers
- data obtained without a warrant.

Police and prosecutors should be held to the same standard of law as me. These tactics manufacture
criminals using grant money, and account for a significant percentage of inmates in Virginia and nationwide.

I wrote this book to inform everyone about how our Fourth Amendment rights are eroding away
because people do not understand modern technology as it relates to the law.

- Law enforcement needs to understand why the current techniques violate the privacy laws,
and how to catch online criminals correctly without violating citizen's Fourth Amendment rights.
- Attorneys and judges will find a wealth of references to law, case law, and explanations
of the technology referenced in the law.
- Politicians need to understand the ramification of their statutes, what is poorly written,
and how to improve it.
- General citizens will learn about these law enforcement techniques and how they should be done.
- Everyone should ponder whether billions of our tax dollars should be spent to rescue zero children
from manufactured criminals.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781666225143
Publisher:	Barnes & Noble Press
Publication date:	12/20/2020
Pages:	396
Sales rank:	487,552
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.81(d)

About the Author

Ms. Burkhardt has a Top Secret security clearance and over 35 years of experience intercepting
and analyzing signals for Department of Defense. She is a software engineer who develops
software and techniques to analyze intercepted weapons signals. She also has worked
as a network protocol engineer and a system administrator. As such, she is well trained
by the federal government on interception and privacy laws for her job. This experience gave
her a unique perspective on privacy rights in the Electronic Age.

Acquaintances were being arrested from online sting operations which seemed out of character.
Their description of the operation sounded fishy and in violation of her training on
Fourth Amendment rights. She researched the federal and state law behind her training and
applied this knowledge to the police operations. As an empty nester, she became more involved
in politics. She became an activist for privacy rights in the Electronic Age,
mixing her professional experience with her volunteer activities in politics.
In recent years she began consulting as an expert witness.

Ms. Burkhardt is an engineer who graduated with a B.S. degree in Applied Mathematics
and an emphasis in Computer Science from the e University of Colorado,
College of Engineering and Applied Science in Boulder.
After graduating and then marrying her college sweetheart, the newlyweds moved to California
where both of them took positions with GTE Government Systems.
While working in California, Ms. Burkhardt attended the University of Santa Clara part-time
and received her M.S. degree in Computer Science and Engineering.

Ms. Burkhardt and her husband moved to Virginia where they settled and had two daughters.
As children came into their lives, she switched to working part-time. Eventually she formed
her own company to give her more flexibility as a mother. She continues to be active
in her church as a Stephen minister and in the church choir.