[privacy] Big Brother is watching

[Richard M. Smith]

Revelations Began in Routine Tax Inquiry
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/11/nyregion/11inquire.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogi
n

The rendezvous that established Gov. Eliot Spitzer's involvement with
high-priced prostitutes occurred last month in one of Washington's grandest
hotels, but the criminal investigation that discovered the tryst began last
year in a nondescript office building opposite a Dunkin' Donuts on Long
Island, according to law enforcement officials.

There, in the Hauppauge offices of the Internal Revenue Service,
investigators conducting a routine examination of suspicious financial
transactions reported to them by banks found several unusual movements of
cash involving the governor of New York, several officials said.

The investigators working out of the three-story office building, which
faces Veterans Highway, typically review such reports, the officials said.
But this was not typical: transactions by a governor who appeared to be
trying to conceal the source, destination or purpose of the movement of
thousands of dollars in cash, said the officials, who spoke on condition of
anonymity.

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