Talk:United States Federal Witness Protection Program

message: How long do programmes last for? Indefinitely? Till the end of the case? Or till the witness/relatives die? Wondered this after seeing a cameo by a certain character in episode six of season five of The Wire. --81.102.216.3 (talk) 14:39, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: No printed or electronic sources to back this up, but according to my grandfather who was an FBI agent, once Witness Protection is granted, it's permanent; you retain your new identity and have 24 hour support from the US Marshals if you need it for the remainder of your life. Either that, or you may keep it until it's safe to revert back to your original identity, but this is very rare. Usually it's permanent. 72.28.178.20 (talk) 16:00, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Length of programme

message: "Around 17% of protected witnesses will commit another crime, compared to the less than the 40% of parolees who return to crime."
The first half of this sentence makes sense.67.169.63.116 09:11, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: After doing some research an checking the artcile which it is sourced from (well done person who did that cos it enabled verification) the statement is exactly true. I will revert it back to how it was. --PrincessBrat 12:08, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

text: Many turned state's evidence in exchange for leniency Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 21:15, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

text: Quite a few witnesses who were involved in organized crime had committed crimes in the past and a fair number of times, continue to commit crimes while under protection. In some cases, their protected status was revoked for multiple felonies.Wzrd1 (talk) 03:05, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Huh? 

message: Why the extensive lists of media that involve WPP? It isn't that notable, and the article is turning into a list of trivial mentions that have nothing to do with the article's subject (see WP:TRIVIA). If no one objects, I will remove these lists. --Scottie theNerd 08:54, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  WPP in Fiction 

message: Joe Dirt
Hey, that's funny!  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.212.151.200 (talk) 03:50, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: WPP in the Theaters

message: It would be of interest to include information here on what kind of person is, or is not, considered suitable for witness protection.
Presumably, someone who is widely known in their profession would not be a suitable candidate, because they would be unlikely to be able to hide successfully under a new identity, and too many people would insist on investigating their mysterious disappearance.  (Extreme example:  movie/TV celebrities.)
Also, someone who has "too many" relatives or acquaintances, spread all over the map, might not be suitable for witness protection, because there may not be any feasible location into which the person could "disappear" without a real risk of randomly running into someone who knew them before they went into the program.  Given the increasingly mobile nature of American society, this could be much more of an obstacle to effective witness protection than in past times.
And, in some cases, I can imagine someone might simply not be willing to abandon their identity and all their relatives and friends, even if failing to do so might put their life in danger.  Can a potential witness (I'm talking here about someone who hasn't committed any crime, but is an innocent witness to someone else's crime) be legally forced into witness protection — such as by threatening them with contempt-of-court proceedings for refusing to testify — or by threatening to file endangerment charges against them for putting family members at risk by refusing to allow their entire family to disappear?  Are there any cases of this kind that can be cited or described?  Richwales (talk) 19:25, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suitability for the program 

message: From article as of 28 May 2009: Around 17 percent of protected witnesses who have committed a crime will be caught committing another crime, compared to the almost 40 percent of parolees who return to crime.
What is the proportion of "protected witnesses who have committed a crime" versus "protected witnesses who have not committed a crime"? I realise that to be a witness of value to prosecution, very often it is someone who is involved in criminal activity or who associates with criminals, but one would think that some protected witnesses are innocent victims? Is this stat available? Naaman Brown (talk) 02:02, 29 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  protected witnesses: criminal v innocent 

message: Notable as first case of its type brought in the history of the program? --Haruth (talk) 05:19, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Support: John Thomas Ambrose should be merged, it's a stub, and should be merged, perhaps into its own section, but by itself it seems somewhat orphaned. petiatil »User »Contribs 20:31, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

text: Support. Not enough about the subject himself for there to be a stand-alone article. Location (talk) 20:59, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

text: Oppose. Witness Protection Program itself is barely more than a stub itself and this article has the potential to grow later. KenBest (talk) 22:27, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

text: Support John Thomas Ambrose is simply way too small to be its own article.KeeperOfTheInformation (talk) 01:40, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

text: Support The information in the article on Ambrose belongs in this one. Since the creation of John Thomas Ambrose there have been no major content adding edits.Themself (talk) 21:54, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge proposal - John Thomas Ambrose

message: Are works of the United States government not in the public domain? --superioridad (discusión) 07:44, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Copyvio concerns 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on United States Federal Witness Protection Program. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20090502140324/http://www.suntimes.com:80/news/mob/1547639,marshal-ambrose-trial-loses-juror-042809.article to http://www.suntimes.com/news/mob/1547639,marshal-ambrose-trial-loses-juror-042809.article
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers. —cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 12:32, 17 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on United States Federal Witness Protection Program. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20100225144609/http://www.fbi.gov:80/publications/leb/2004/may2004/may04leb.htm to http://www.fbi.gov/publications/leb/2004/may2004/may04leb.htm#page_26
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at ).
Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 03:24, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: This article is disgraceful! It contains NO information about what the witness protection program does, other than it "protects witnesses."
I can't add this info since I don't know it, but if someone doesn't, articles like this make WP look like a micky-mouse job.
Verdana♥Bold 14:09, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  more into needed! 

message: It would be nice to list some persons protected (and officially known as that), for instance the assassin Michael Townley
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Townley  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.170.196.53 (talk) 13:53, 30 March 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Examples (persons) 

message: — Assignment last updated by JanelleNDri (talk) 16:45, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Wiki Education assignment: ENWR 1510 Writing and Critical Inquiry