Perhaps I wasn't clear. I wasn't asking these questions. Their answer doesn't matter.
The discussion is not about whether these guys are innocent as the driven snow or guilty as sin.
The discussion is about whether the GOVERNMENT is following the rules, what those rules are, and how the GOVERNMENT's claim and the rules affects all of us in the future.
The government always uses the worst scum they can find to establish a precedent to use on us little guys later. That's why, for instance, it's child pornographers and molesters they go after when they're attacking free speech, censorship of the Internet, or the privacy of your electronic records and communications.
You don't get to relax the rules just because the accusation is great. If anything, it's when the accusation is greatest that it's most important that the accused's rights be protected.
The government doesn't get to break the rules itself when it's going after rule-breakers. The legal system is about the RULES for handling breakers of the rules. Trying to get the rule-enforcers to enforce the rules on themselves is extremely difficult. The only thing we've found to work even moderately well, so far, is to make them LOSE when they break the rules themselves. Thus the doctrine of "fruit of the poisoned tree" - the suppression of evidence collected illegally.
The result, of course, is that when the police and prosecutors break the rules, the accused goes free, even if he's guilty as sin. Yes, if he's an offender and likely to repeat or escalate in the future this is bad. But a runaway government is worse.
He's a child molester? A runaway government is worse.
He's a serial murderer? A runaway government is worse.
He's part of a conspiracy to set off a hydrogen bomb on Manhattan Island? A runaway government is worse.
Because a runaway government descends into tyranny. It kills or maims anyone it wants. It steals the resources of anyone it wants. It controls the lives of anyone it wants, for its own benefit and their detriment. It does it to everyone, in detail. Until it is stopped.
Without such tools as suppression of evidence and "standing" to compel revelation of the information necessary to determine whether evidence should be suppressed, it almost certainly won't be stopped in our lifetime, short of a violent revolution - after which the replacement would likely be even worse.