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Islamic extremists bent on violent acts against free-speech nations are sometimes overlooked by intelligence agencies because the agencies reject important information that could derail attacks, says a former CIA adviser and intelligence expert.

Instead, the agencies set their sights on targets that fit scenarios they believe will happen, failing to realize that “anything that does happen, can happen. Intelligence reports tend to ignore them if they don’t fit,” said John B. Alexander, a member of the Las Vegas Chapter of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers.

Inherently, those charged with analyzing intelligence information sometimes have “scotomas,” or areas of diminished vision.

“They get this target ‘fixation,’ ” he said. “Here’s the scenario. So we will look for data that support our proposed scenario. So the ‘outliers’ fall off and don’t get incorporated into the analysis. … These are things that they don’t believe can happen but do.”

CIA sometimes overlooks Islamic extremists, Vegas intelligence expert says