FBI Wants Insane Clown Posse Lawsuit Dismissed

ICP filed a lawsuit in September 2012 after the FBI’s 2011 National Gang Threat Assessment Emerging Trends report listed its fans, famously known as Juggalos, as “a loosely-organized hybrid gang rapidly expanding into many U.S. communities.”

The assessment reported, “Most crimes committed by Juggalos are sporadic, disorganized, individualistic, and often involve simple assault, personal drug use and possession, petty theft and vandalism. However, open source reporting suggests that a small number of Juggalos are forming more organized subsets and engaging in more gang-like criminal activity, such as felony assaults, thefts, robberies and drug sales.”

ICP was absolutely shocked by the claims and wrote in a statement on its site that, “The idea of calling the Juggalos and Juggalettes a ‘gang’ is straight up bullshit. We are not a gang! We are a family!” The band said it was suing the FBI because it had failed “to produce any documentary evidence” that the Juggalos are a gang.

In the lawsuit, the band says its lawyer requested information from the FBI via the Freedom of Information Act about the investigation that landed the Juggalos on the Gang Threat Assessment, according to the Flint Journal/Mlive.com.

The FBI filed a motion for summary disposition Aug. 23, explaining that the bureau already turned in all pertinent records. The Journal reports “the FBI claims that it reviewed 63 pages of records and released 62 of them on Dec. 6, 2012, and reviewed 93 more pages of records before releasing 40 pages of them on Jan. 30.”

ICP’s lawyer, Howard Hertz, told the paper he’s still developing a response to the FBI’s motion. But don’t worry – he will do all he can to clear the good name of the Juggalos.

“The intent now is to evaluate and find the proper plaintiffs to bring an action on their behalf to have the Juggalos removed from the FBI list,” Hertz told the Journal, which noted that a trial in the case was not expected to begin until May 2014.