How far can cooperation between law enforcement and intelligence agencies go?
<p><a href="https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1164085/sidtoday-dea-the-other-warfighter.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1164085/sidtoday-dea-the-other-warfighter.pdf</a></p>
<p>This is a report explaining that DEA was aided by NSA's surveillance system at the time they were persecuting a wanted criminal Gonzalo Hinojosa while he had been in Panama by using data obtained by NSA's systems. The report suggests this person was very evasive and dangerous perhaps this is why DEA collaborated with NSA.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intelligence-laundering" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intelligence-laundering</a></p>
<p>Another example of LE and NSA cooperation.</p>
<p>Shouldn't NSA be concerned only about foreing intelligence without doing anything related to LE? If there is a reason for such cooperation to exist, how far can cooperation between a LE organization go with an intelligence agency of the same country? And what type of criminal actions substantiate to do this? Terrorism, child abuse, et cetera.</p>
<p>For example, if FBI wanted to research more about a wanted person inside another country out of their reach, may it use NSA's systems to track down this person's movement with cellular networking? Or spy on his Internet activity with surveillance systems mentioned?</p>

<h2>As far as the legal powers of the organisation(s) allow</h2>
<p>By this, I mean that if what the DEA was doing was allowed under the laws that govern the DEA, and what the NSA was doing was allowed under the laws that govern the NSA, then they can cooperate as much as they want. The could investigate jaywalking together if they wanted (of course, this would have to be jaywalking within Federal jurisdiction).</p>
<p>Divisions in executive government are practical rather than legal. That is, the executive can carry out &quot;intelligence&quot; and &quot;law enforcement&quot; and as a practical matter, they are carried out by different agencies. However, they are functions of the executive and could be carried out by one mega-agency if they wanted to set things up that way. Indeed, the Department of Homeland Security is such a mega-agency.</p>

<h2>Intelligence <strong>is</strong> Law Enforcement.</h2>
<p><a href="/questions/tagged/germany" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;germany&#39;" aria-label="show questions tagged &#39;germany&#39;" rel="tag" aria-labelledby="tag-germany-tooltip-container">germany</a></p>
<p><a href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nachrichtendienste_des_Bundes" rel="nofollow noreferrer">BND, Verfassungsschutz and MAD and the Landesbehörden für Verfassungsschutz create <strong>19</strong> branches of intelligence organisations</a>. Those are specially classed as <em>Nachrichtendienste</em> in german law, separate from the federal police branches of Bundeskriminalamt (roughly equivalent ot the FBI), the Zollkriminalamt (roughly the customs and border patrol) and other federal police or military.</p>
<p>There is a special setup, that bans the intelligence agencies from doing policing in many areas, the <a href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trennungsgebot_zwischen_Polizei_und_Nachrichtendiensten" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Trennungsgebot</a>.</p>
<p>However, that does not make them not law enforcement - they enforce <strong>different</strong> laws. The most relevant are the <a href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundesamt_f%C3%BCr_Verfassungsschutz#Auftrag" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Verfassungsschutz</a> (and similarly the 16 separate Landesbehörden für Verfassungsschutz). They are tasked with exclusively:</p>
<ul>
<li>investigate threats to the german democracy, such as insurgent groups or terrorist groups inside Germany.
<ul>
<li>being part of such a group is a crime.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Finding spies inside Germany.
<ul>
<li>spying in Germany is a crime.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Develop guidance documents that govern how to protect state secrets. The same documents are also suggestions for the economy how to protect trade secrets.</li>
</ul>

united-states criminal-law any-jurisdiction surveillance