Keefe 's '' The Snakehead '' reported on Cheng Chui Ping and her Snakehead gang in New York City that operated between 1984 and 2000 . Keefe described how Ping illegally smuggled immigrants from China into the United States on a massive scale through cargo ships . The book included interviews with several of those immigrants where they describe their lives in the United States . In 2000 , Ping was arrested by the United States government and sentenced to 35 years in prison for her part in leading these operations . Janet Maslin of the '' New York Times '' described '' The Snakehead '' as a " formidably well-researched book that is as much a paean to its author ’s industriousness as it is a chronicle of crime . " In '' Chatter : Dispatches From the Secret World Of Global Eavesdropping '' , Keefe described how American security agencies , including the National Security Agency , eavesdrop on communications between individuals suspected of involvement in terrorism to determine the likelihood of terrorist attacks occurring in the near future . Keefe describes the electronic intelligence gathering apparatus for detecting this communication , often referred to as " chatter " , which he examines in the context of the September 11 attacks . In a review of the book for The New York Times , William Grimes states that " Mr. Keefe writes , crisply and entertainingly , as an interested private citizen rather than an expert . "
September 11 attacks
September 11 attacks
Patrick Radden Keefe