Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Patriot Act E-Mail Searches Apply to Non-Terrorists, Judges Say
According to The New York Sun, “Two federal judges in Florida have upheld the authority of individual courts to use the Patriot Act to order searches anywhere in the country for e-mails and computer data in all types of criminal investigations, overruling a magistrate who found that Congress limited such expanded jurisdiction to cases involving terrorism.”
Democrats Seek Probe of NSA Eavesdropping
“Attorney General Alberto Gonzales should appoint a special counsel to investigate the legality of the Bush administration's eavesdropping program, 18 House Democrats told President Bush in a letter released Monday.” According to the Associated Press, “The lawmakers said the surveillance of terrorists must be done within the bounds of U.S. law, but complained that their efforts to get answers to legal and factual questions about the program have been stymied — ‘generally based on the feeblest of excuses.’”
NYT Sues Pentagon Over Domestic Spying
According to Reuters, “The New York Times sued the U.S. Defense Department on Monday demanding that it hand over documents about the National Security Agency's domestic spying program.” The report claims that The Times wants a list of documents including all internal memos and e-mails about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval along with the names of the people or groups identified by it.
Verizon Faces New $20B Suit over NSA Spying Complicity
“Upping the ante in what may be a high-stakes legal battle, an Upstate New York lawyer filed a $20 billion class-action lawsuit against Verizon last week, charging that the company violated customer confidentiality in aiding warrantless eavesdropping by a federal spy agency.” According to The New Standard, “The civil suit is the second to challenge corporations for helping the National Security Agency carry out a secret order by the president to spy on communications between people in the United States and parties overseas without first obtaining warrants.”
Justice Dept. Rejects Google's Privacy Issues
“Google Inc.'s concerns that a Bush administration demand to examine millions of its users' Internet search requests would violate privacy rights are unwarranted, the Justice Department said Friday in a court filing.” According to Lexis, “The 18-page brief argued that because the information provided would not identify or be traceable to specific users, privacy rights would not be violated.”
Year Into Revamped Spying, Troubles and Some Progress
“A year after a sweeping government reorganization began,” reports The New York Times, “the agencies charged with protecting the United States against terrorist attacks remain troubled by high-level turnover, overlapping responsibilities and bureaucratic rivalry, former and current officials say.”
U.S. Is Settling Detainee's Suit in 9/11 Sweep
The New York Times reports, “The federal government has agreed to pay $300,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by an Egyptian who was among dozens of Muslim men swept up in the New York area after 9/11, held for months in a federal detention center in Brooklyn and deported after being cleared of links to terrorism.”
Monday, February 27, 2006
Dickensian Democracy
“Stripping convicted felons of the right to vote is a slap at America's democratic ideals,” according to this New York Times editorial. According to the editorial, while many states are backing away from this policy, understanding at last that voting rights are in fact basic human rights that should be abridged only in the rarest circumstances, that lesson has yet to penetrate the state of Washington, which has created a form of disenfranchisement that is straight out of “Oliver Twist.”
Specter Proposes NSA Surveillance Rules
According to this article by The Washington Post, “The federal government would have to obtain permission from a secret court to continue a controversial form of surveillance, which the National Security Agency now conducts without warrants, under a bill being proposed by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.).”
Despite Govt. Cries, Privacy Laws Trail Technology
“The ever-innovative field of electronic communications that brought us e-mail, cell phones and instant messaging can take a heavy toll on personal privacy,” reports The New Standard. “According to a privacy-rights group’s recently released report, the exponential growth of technology accessible to government and corporate snooping is proof positive that lawmakers must update privacy protections to ‘reflect the technological realities of a new century.’”
Pentagon Told to Release Gitmo Transcripts
According to FindLaw, “A federal judge ordered the Pentagon on Thursday to release the identities of hundreds of detainees at Guantanamo Bay to The Associated Press, a move which would force the government to break its secrecy and reveal the most comprehensive list yet of those who have been imprisoned there.”
A Growing Afghan Prison Rivals Bleak Guantánamo
“While an international debate rages over the future of the American detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, the military has quietly expanded another, less-visible prison in Afghanistan, where it now holds some 500 terror suspects in more primitive conditions, indefinitely and without charges.” According to The New York Times, “Pentagon officials have often described the detention site at Bagram, a cavernous former machine shop on an American air base 40 miles north of Kabul, as a screening center.”
Friday, February 24, 2006
Bush's Mysterious 'New Programs'
Consortium News has this article entitled “Bush’s Mysterious New Programs,” which discusses a myriad of new programs emerging causing civil libertarians concern such as domestic detention centers, labor camps and Pentagon spying.
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Top Bush Aide Is Said to Halt Spy Briefing
The New York Times reports, “A top intelligence official was prepared to brief the House Intelligence Committee about President Bush's domestic eavesdropping program in December but was stopped by the White House chief of staff, the ranking Democrat on the committee said Tuesday.”
Specter Eyes Measure to Curb Surveillance
“Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter is drafting legislation to curtail President Bush's warrantless surveillance program that the president touts as a tool to stop and capture terrorists,” reports The Washington Times. “While it is not clear how such a law would work -- or even if Congress has the authority to pass such legislation -- Mr. Specter said he hopes to offer something in the coming weeks.”
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
School Bus Drivers Latest ‘Terror War’ Recruits
“You expect the bus driver who picks your kids up for school each morning to keep a close eye on them.” “But,” according to The New Standard, “he or she could in fact be keeping a closer eye on you and your neighbors – just to make sure you aren’t the type who would slip a bomb into a ‘Dora the Explorer’ backpack and sneak it onboard.”
Germany Weighs if It Played Role in Seizure by U.S.
“For more than a year, the German government has criticized the United States for its role in the abduction of a German man who was taken to an American prison in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he said he was held and tortured for five months after being mistaken for a terrorism suspect.” According to The New York Times, “Mr. Masri's case has come to symbolize the C.I.A. practice known as extraordinary rendition, in which terror suspects are sent to be interrogated in other countries where torture is commonly used.”
Monday, February 20, 2006
Lawsuit Filed Against Verizon for Wiretapping
“An attorney and entrepreneur has filed a lawsuit against Verizon Communications Inc. alleging it has illegally collaborated with the National Security Agency's wiretapping operations,” reports Law.com. “The suit by Michael Pascazi of Fishkill, N.Y., seeks to represent millions of Verizon customers in a class action.”
AT&T Collaborated With NSA to Invade Americans' Privacy, Suit Says
“A purported class-action lawsuit against AT&T Corp. alleges the telecommunications giant has allowed the National Security Agency access to its facilities and databases for the purpose of spying on American citizens.” FindLaw reports, “The purpose of the suit is to challenge the legality of AT&T's alleged participation in a ‘secret and illegal’ government program to intercept and analyze Americans' telephone and Internet communications, according to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.”
Privacy Guardian Is Still a Paper Tiger
“For Americans troubled by the prospect of federal agents eavesdropping on their phone conversations or combing through their Internet records, there is good news: A little-known board exists in the White House whose purpose is to ensure that privacy and civil liberties are protected in the fight against terrorism.” The problem, however, according to The Los Angeles Times, is a year after being created it still hasn’t met; leading many to believe the board is simply a paper tiger.
Friday, February 17, 2006
Judge Orders Action on Spying Documents
The Associated Press reports, “A federal judge dealt a setback to the Bush administration on its warrantless surveillance program, ordering the Justice Department on Thursday to release documents about the highly classified effort within 20 days or compile a list of what it is withholding.” According to the report, “U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy said a private group will suffer irreparable harm if the documents it has been seeking since December are not processed promptly under the Freedom of Information Act.”
Senate Rejects Wiretapping Probe
The Washington Post reports, “The Bush administration helped derail a Senate bid to investigate a warrantless eavesdropping program yesterday after signaling it would reject Congress's request to have former attorney general John D. Ashcroft and other officials testify about the program's legality.” “The actions underscored a dramatic and possibly permanent drop in momentum for a congressional inquiry, which had seemed likely two months ago.”
Patriot Act Moves Closer to Renewal
“The Senate overwhelmingly rejected an effort Thursday to block renewing the Patriot Act, the 2001 law passed weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks to help the government hunt down terrorists.” According to The Associated Press, “The 96-3 vote was no surprise to Sen. Russell Feingold, the Wisconsin Democrat who was the lone senator to oppose the law four and a half years ago and is the chief obstacle to extending 16 provisions now due to expire March 10.”
Accord in House to Hold Inquiry on Surveillance
“Leaders of the House Intelligence Committee said Thursday that they had agreed to open a Congressional inquiry prompted by the Bush administration's domestic surveillance program.” “But,” according to The New York Times, “a dispute immediately broke out among committee Republicans over the scope of the inquiry.”
Thursday, February 16, 2006
Feingold Again Tries to Block Patriot Act
“In a case of legislative deja vu,” reports the Associated Press, “Sen. Russell Feingold launched another lonely filibuster against the USA Patriot Act, but sponsors predicted enough support to overcome the objection and extend parts of the law set to expire March 10.” According to the report, “Feingold said protracted talks with the White House over the law's protections for civil liberties produced only a ‘fig leaf’ to cover weaknesses that leave people vulnerable to government intrusion.”
Groups May Win Release of NSA Spying Documents
According to The New Standard, “Privacy watchdog groups may soon get some answers from the federal government about the controversial National Security Agency’s warrantless domestic surveillance program undertaken after the September 11 terror attacks. Responding to several consolidated lawsuits in federal court last week, the Department of Justice indicated that it could begin releasing documents relating to the presidential order in early March.”
Justice Department Reviews Role of Its Lawyers in Spying
“The ethics office of the Justice Department has begun a review of the department's role in the National Security Agency's domestic eavesdropping program, a move that could shed light on internal dissension over the legal status of the secret program.” The New York Times reports, “The review, being conducted by the department's Office of Professional Responsibility, is the first formal government inquiry into the surveillance program since its existence was reported by The New York Times in December.”
U.N. Report Calls for End to Guantánamo Detentions
“A United Nations report today called on the United States to immediately close the detention center for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and to either release its inmates or bring them to trial.” According to The New York Times, “The report, by a team of five inspectors for the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva, blasted the American government for a litany of abuses, and said that certain practices at the prison camp ‘must be assessed as amounting to torture.’”
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Whistleblower Says NSA Violations Bigger
“A former NSA employee said Tuesday there is another ongoing top-secret surveillance program that might have violated millions of Americans' Constitutional rights.” According to United Press International, “Russell D. Tice told the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations he has concerns about a ‘special access’ electronic surveillance program that he characterized as far more wide-ranging than the warrentless wiretapping recently exposed by the New York Times but he is forbidden from discussing the program with Congress.”
Fifth of Americans Think Calls Have Been Monitored
“About a fifth of Americans think federal agents have listened in on their phone calls, a CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll released Tuesday suggests.” According to CNN, “Twenty-one percent of the 1,000 adults who replied to the survey conducted Thursday through Sunday said it was very likely or somewhat likely their conversations had been wiretapped, while 52 percent said it was not at all likely.”
3rd Circuit Weighs In on Warrantless Searches
“Police may not ‘manufacture’ an emergency situation to justify the warrantless search of a hotel room, a divided panel of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled.” According to Law.com, “The decision in United States v. Coles overturns a conviction for possession of crack cocaine and sharpens a split among the federal circuits in cases where police claim that a warrantless search was justified by ‘exigent circumstances.’”
Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Lawyers Group Says Bush Exceeds His Powers
According to The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, “The American Bar Association denounced President Bush's warrantless domestic surveillance program Monday, accusing him of exceeding his powers under the Constitution.” “The nation's largest organization of lawyers adopted a policy opposing any future government use of electronic surveillance in the United States for foreign intelligence purposes without first obtaining warrants from a special court set up under the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.”
U.N. Report: U.S. Tortures Detainees
According to CBS News, “A U.N. investigation found that the United States committed acts amounting to torture at Guantanamo Bay, including force-feeding detainees and subjecting them to prolonged solitary confinement, according to a draft report obtained Monday.”
Monday, February 13, 2006
Consensus Grows for Curbs on Surveillance
“Bipartisan support on Capitol Hill for stricter regulation of President Bush's secret spying program grew Thursday,” according to The Los Angeles Times, “as senators briefed by administration officials about the surveillance termed the information inadequate, and called for more investigation of the eavesdropping.”
Inquiry Into Wiretapping Article Widens
The New York Times reports, “Federal agents have interviewed officials at several of the country's law enforcement and national security agencies in a rapidly expanding criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding a New York Times article published in December that disclosed the existence of a highly classified domestic eavesdropping program, according to government officials.” “People who have been interviewed and others in the government who have been briefed on the interviews said the investigation seemed to lay the groundwork for a grand jury inquiry that could lead to criminal charges.”
Innocent, but in Limbo at Guantánamo
“Five Muslim detainees from China's western Xinjiang province are stranded in a legal no man's land at the US terrorism prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.” “They shouldn't be there. Even the US military has found that the men, members of the besieged Uighur ethnic group, are not enemy combatants.” “But,” according to The Christian Science Monitor, “their ordeal in custody isn't over.”
Friday, February 10, 2006
Feds to Fine Protesters for Gitmo March
According to The New Standard, “The Treasury Department is seeking to punish a religious group that marched outside the secretive Guantánamo Bay prison complex in protest of the conditions endured there by prisoners in the ‘war on terror.’”
Seized With Heavy Hand at Border, for Paperwork Errors
The New York Times has this article discussing how low-level gatekeepers and prosecutors in the customs and immigration system are using their growing discretionary power over travelers who pose no security risk. The report begins, “One is a second grader in Manhattan. Over the protests of his American mother, immigration officials have been trying to deport him ever since he returned from a brief visit to his native Canada without the right visa. Another is an Irish professor of literature invited to teach at the University of Pennsylvania last month. He was handcuffed at the Philadelphia airport, strip-searched, jailed overnight and sent back to Europe to correct an omission in his travel papers.”
Patriot Act Compromise Clears Way for Senate Vote
“Efforts to extend the USA Patriot Act cleared a major hurdle yesterday when the White House and key senators agreed to revisions that are virtually certain to secure Senate passage and likely to win House approval, congressional leaders said.” According to The Washington Post, “Several Democrats said the compromise announced yesterday lacks important civil liberties safeguards, and even the Republican negotiators said they had to yield to the administration on several points.”
Thursday, February 09, 2006
Statement of Senator Russ Feingold
The Rutherford Institute’s OldSpeak has this statement by Senator Russ Feingold in response to President Bush’s comments during his State of the Union Address about the domestic spying program. Senator Feingold states, “The President was blunt, so I will be blunt: This program is breaking the law, and this President is breaking the law. Not only that, he is misleading the American people in his efforts to justify this program.”
Specter Wants Special Court to Supervise Surveillance
“A special federal court would be given power to supervise the Bush administration's warrantless surveillance program under a bill being written by a key Senate Republican,” reports USA Today. “Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in an interview Wednesday that he wants to ‘assert Congress' constitutional authority’ while allowing the anti-terrorism program to continue under court supervision.”
Secret Court's Judges Were Warned About NSA Spy Data
“Twice in the past four years,” according to The Washington Post, “a top Justice Department lawyer warned the presiding judge of a secret surveillance court that information overheard in President Bush's eavesdropping program may have been improperly used to obtain wiretap warrants in the court, according to two sources with knowledge of those events.” “The revelations,” according to the report, “infuriated U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly -- who, like her predecessor, Royce C. Lamberth, had expressed serious doubts about whether the warrantless monitoring of phone calls and e-mails ordered by Bush was legal.”
US Plans Massive Data Sweep
According to The Christian Science Monitor, “The US government is developing a massive computer system that can collect huge amounts of data and, by linking far-flung information from blogs and e-mail to government records and intelligence reports, search for patterns of terrorist activity.”
Senate Toughens Scrutiny of Wiretapping
“In open hearings and behind closed doors, the Senate this week opened a broad - and often tense - dialogue with the Bush administration over the president's wartime powers.” “It's more than just a probe into who authorized what, when, and why in a recently disclosed domestic eavesdropping program,” reports The Christian Science Monitor. “If the president is not checked, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle argue, then the constitutional balance of power could shift away from the Congress for at least a generation.”
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
Republican Who Oversees N.S.A. Calls for Wiretap Inquiry
“A House Republican whose subcommittee oversees the National Security Agency broke ranks with the White House on Tuesday and called for a full Congressional inquiry into the Bush administration's domestic eavesdropping program.” According to The New York Times, “The lawmaker, Representative Heather A. Wilson of New Mexico, chairwoman of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence, said in an interview that she had ‘serious concerns’ about the surveillance program.”
Judge Is Urged to Intervene for Detainee Held in Iraq
“Lawyers for a 44-year-old naturalized American citizen have been pressing a federal district judge to intervene in their client's case, saying that he had been arrested and held in Iraq for more than a year without being charged or given access to a lawyer,” reports The New York Times. The detained American’s lawyers have asked Judge Ricardo M. Urbina to review his case, which they have asserted has resulted in wide-scale violations of the rights to which he is entitled as a United States citizen.
Limiting NSA Spying Is Inconsistent With Rationale, Critics Say
“Ever since media reports revealed the existence of a warrantless government eavesdropping program targeting U.S. citizens and residents, Bush administration officials have taken great pains to emphasize that the effort involves only international telephone calls and e-mails.” “The question from both Democratic and Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing Monday,” according to The Washington Post, “was: Why stop there? Why not intercept domestic calls, as well?”
Tuesday, February 07, 2006
In Limelight at Wiretap Hearing: 2 Laws, but Which Should Rule?
“It is the sort of problem that judges confront every day,” according to The New York Times. “One law forbids a certain activity. The other may allow it. Which one counts?” “Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales made the case to the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday that two potentially contradictory Congressional actions — one a 1978 law forbidding domestic surveillance without a court's permission, the other a 2001 resolution giving the president authority to use force to combat Al Qaeda — together mean that the executive branch is free to decide on its own to spy on communications between people in the United States and those abroad.”
Attorney General Defense of Spying Program Challenged by Senate Judiciary Chairman and Top Democrat
“Attorney General Alberto Gonzales insisted Monday that President George W. Bush was ‘acting with authority’ both under the U.S. Constitution and federal law in eavesdropping on Americans without warrants as part of the war on terror.” “But,” according to FindLaw, “his strong defense of Bush's program was challenged by Republican Sen. Arlen Specter, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who told Gonzales that even the Supreme Court had ruled that ‘the president does not have a blank check.’”
Ex-President Carter: Eavesdropping Illegal
Former President Jimmy Carter criticized the Bush administration's domestic eavesdropping program Monday and said he believes the president has broken the law, reports The Washington Post. “Under the Bush administration, there's been a disgraceful and illegal decision--we're not going to the let the judges or the Congress or anyone else know that we're spying on the American people,” Carter told reporters.
On Eve of Hearing, Split on Spying
As hearings began yesterday on President Bush's domestic spying program, reports The Boston Globe, increasing numbers of prominent conservatives are breaking with the administration to say the program is probably illegal and to sharply criticize Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales's legal theory that a wartime president can override a law. According to the report, “The skeptics include leaders of conservative activist groups, well-known law professors, veterans of Republican administrations, former GOP members of Congress, and think tank analysts.”
Monday, February 06, 2006
Surveillance Net Yields Few Suspects
Despite President Bush’s recent references to the NSA’s domestic surveillance program as “terrorist surveillance,” The Washington Post reports, “Intelligence officers who eavesdropped on thousands of Americans in overseas calls under authority from President Bush have dismissed nearly all of them as potential suspects after hearing nothing pertinent to a terrorist threat, according to accounts from current and former government officials and private-sector sources with knowledge of the technologies in use.”
Specter Says Surveillance Program Violated the Law
The Republican who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee said Sunday that he believed the Bush administration had violated the law with its warrantless surveillance program and that its legal justifications for the program were “strained and unrealistic,” reports The New York Times. “The program ‘is in flat violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act,’ said the chairman, Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who will open committee hearings on Monday.”
For Some, Spying Controversy Recalls a Past Drama
The New York Times has this article that begins, “As the Senate prepares to hold hearings on Monday on domestic eavesdropping by the National Security Agency, old Washington hands see a striking similarity to a drama that unfolded three decades ago in the capital.” According to the article, “Both in 1975 and today, officials defending the N.S.A. operation said it had prevented terrorist attacks. And Dick Cheney, who as vice president has overseen secret briefings for selected members of Congress on the N.S.A. program, was in the White House then, too, serving as a deputy to President Gerald R. Ford before succeeding Donald H. Rumsfeld as chief of staff.”
Specialists Doubt Legality of Wiretaps
“Legal specialists yesterday,” according to The Boston Globe, “questioned the accuracy of President Bush's sweeping contentions about the legality of his domestic spying program, particularly his assertion in his State of the Union speech on Tuesday that ‘previous presidents have used the same constitutional authority I have.’"
Senate Session on Security Erupts in Spying Debate
“Senate Democrats on Thursday,” reports The New York Times, “angrily accused the Bush administration of mounting a public relations campaign to defend the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program while withholding details of the secret eavesdropping from Congressional oversight committees.”
Friday, February 03, 2006
NSA's Struggle to Tap a Wily Foe
The Christian Science Monitor has this article discussing the changing nature of the NSA’s ability to track and eavesdrop on Al Qaeda since the mid-1990s when it was a relatively simple intelligence gathering task. The report states, “The nation's biggest and most secretive intelligence agency is struggling to tap an adversary for whom the very nature of communication has changed.”
Internet Jihad: Tackling Terror on the Web
The Christian Science Monitor has this article discussing the “internet jihad” the American government is utilizing as one component in its broader war on terror, arresting those who create and maintain websites promoting Islamic militancy.
House OKs Another 1-Month Patriot Act Extension
“The House yesterday agreed to extend the USA Patriot Act for a month while conservative Republicans and the White House work out changes intended to protect people from government intrusion.” According to The First Amendment Center, “The GOP-controlled House used a voice vote to keep the law in effect until March 10 so negotiators have more time to come up with a deal. The Senate was expected to follow before the law expires tomorrow.”
Specialists Doubt Legality of Wiretaps
“Legal specialists yesterday,” according to The Boston Globe, “questioned the accuracy of President Bush's sweeping contentions about the legality of his domestic spying program, particularly his assertion in his State of the Union speech on Tuesday that ‘previous presidents have used the same constitutional authority I have.’"
Senate Session on Security Erupts in Spying Debate
“Senate Democrats on Thursday,” reports The New York Times, “angrily accused the Bush administration of mounting a public relations campaign to defend the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program while withholding details of the secret eavesdropping from Congressional oversight committees.”
Thursday, February 02, 2006
The End of the Internet?
According to The Nation, “Verizon, Comcast, Bell South and other communications giants are developing strategies that would track and store information on our every move in cyberspace in a vast data-collection and marketing system, the scope of which could rival the National Security Agency.”
AT&T Sued Over NSA Spy Program
“AT&T has been named a defendant in a class action lawsuit that claims the telecommunications company illegally cooperated with the National Security Agency's secret eavesdropping program.” According to CNet, “The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in San Francisco's federal district court, charges that AT&T has opened its telecommunications facilities up to the NSA and continues to ‘to assist the government in its secret surveillance of millions of ordinary Americans.’"
Senate Panel Rebuffed on Documents on U.S. Spying
“The Bush administration,” according to The New York Times, “is rebuffing requests from members of the Senate Judiciary Committee for its classified legal opinions on President Bush's domestic spying program, setting up a confrontation in advance of a hearing scheduled for next week, administration and Congressional officials said Wednesday.”
NYC Holds People Longer Than Legal
ABC News reports that according to a study by the New York Civil Liberties Union more than one-third of people arrested in New York City are illegally held longer than 24 hours before they are arraigned in court. According to the report, “The NYCLU calculated arrests involving the police department and other city and state agencies, including the district attorney's office, the Department of Correction, the Criminal Justice Agency and the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services.”
New Patriot Act Provision Creates Tighter Barrier to Officials at Public Events
FoxNews.com reports, “A new provision tucked into the Patriot Act bill now before Congress would allow authorities to haul demonstrators at any ‘special event of national significance’ away to jail on felony charges if they are caught breaching a security perimeter.” This new provision of the Patriot Act “would extend the authority of the Secret Service to allow agents to arrest people who willingly or knowingly enter a restricted area at an event, even if the president or other official normally protected by the Secret Service isn't in attendance at the time.”
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Patriot Act Provision Could Limit Inmate Appeals
“Anthony Spears has been on Arizona's death row for nearly 13 years, convicted of the murder of his girlfriend near Phoenix. He isn't an international terrorist, has no links to al-Qaida and was in prison on 9-11.” Knight-Ridder Washington Bureau reports that “tucked away in the pending renewal of the Patriot Act - the nation's controversial law to fight terrorism - is a provision inspired by Spears. Republican Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona inserted little-noticed language that could make it harder for state death-row inmates to appeal their cases in federal court.”
Senate Target: Bush's War Powers
“The Senate, especially, is gearing up to make the case that power between the executive and legislative branches is unbalanced. Next week, the Senate begins the first hearings on the president's authorization of eavesdropping without a warrant.” According to this article in The Christian Science Monitor, “At the same time, Republicans are divided over whether to extend 16 provisions of the USA Patriot Act that are set to expire this Friday. Four Senate Republicans are joining most Democrats to demand more protections for civil liberties.”
