Informant: NYPD Paid Me to 'Bait' Muslims

Shamiur Rahman was behind bars in Queens on drug charges when he says he was approached by a plainclothes NYPD officer who offered him a chance to "turn his life around." The 19-year-old said the next month he began to infiltrate a wide variety of Muslim gatherings, including mosques and student groups, where he would snap photos and record conversations with people who had never committed a crime. Rahman, a US citizen of Bengali descent, came forward to the AP after he said he decided his actions were "detrimental to the Constitution."

Rahman says though he received minimal training from the NYPD and spied on "everything and anyone," his handlers were happy with his work. He says he was encouraged to "bait" Muslims using a strategy known as "create and capture," in which he would start a conversation about terrorism, record the responses, and send it to the NYPD (a tactic the department has denied using). He admitted that he would often take things out of context to make his handlers happy. Rahman announced his double life to friends via Facebook and now plans to move to the Caribbean. Click to read the entire article. (More spy stories.)