Standing for ACLU NSA Suit

In the wake of the court's denial of the U.S. National Security Agency surveillance law suit, due to a lack of "standing", I have contacted the ACLU about my situation. I got a reply:

Acknowledge: Standing for Spying Suit (Ticket# LTK69016040512X)...

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ACLU Membership Questions

ACLU Membership Questions

Thank you for contacting the ACLU.

Your comments and questions are very important to us and a representative will respond to your query as soon as possible.

Sincerely,
ACLU

> Dear ACLU:

> I was illegally targeted by law enforcement last year as revenge for my internet writings.

> Please see my blogs

> Free Speech Beneath US Homeland Security

> and

> South Capitol Street Frederick Douglas Mall

> Douglas Willinger

Then later that same day, I received a second message from the ACLU:

RE: Standing for Spying Suit (LTK69016040512X)...

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ACLU Membership Questions

ACLU Membership Questions

Dear Mr. Willinger,

Thank you for contacting the ACLU.

State affiliates of the ACLU handle requests for legal assistance; lobby the state legislatures, and host public forums throughout the year. Your state affiliate is therefore best equipped to handle your concerns.

To find the contact information for your ACLU affiliate office; please visit http://www.aclu.org/ and select your state from the "Your Local ACLU" menu at the bottom of the page.

Please also consider becoming a member of the ACLU. To join, please visit http://www.aclu.org/contribute/contribute.cfm or call 1-888-567-ACLU.

Sincerely,
D. Barber
Correspondence Manager, American Civil Liberties Union

======= Subject: Standing for Spying Suit Dear ACLU:

I have since contacted the local NY chapter, and await a response.

Giving Standing to Sue

You can plausibly piss someone off

and your Constitutional rights shall be violated

The President scheduled to throw the 1st Ball at Nationals Ballpark's 2008 opening

Newsday editorial

A lawsuit challenging the National Security Agency's warrantless wiretapping program was dismissed last week by an appeals court that ruled that the plaintiffs can't sue because they can't prove their calls were among those tapped. If that logic prevails, the courts will have rendered themselves powerless to do anything about what could well be an ongoing violation of the law and the Constitution.

Congress needs to fill that shameful void. It should either explicitly bar the government's unauthorized eavesdropping or pass a bill sponsored by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) that would give citizens standing to sue without a showing of individual harm.

Consider the no-win situation the ruling has created for citizens who think they could be targets of the government's secret monitoring of phone calls and e-mail without probable cause or warrants. The plaintiffs in this case are lawyers, journalists and academics with clients and contacts in the Middle East, making their international communications just the sort that the NSA monitors. Still, the court said they can't sue unless they establish that the NSA in fact monitored their calls. But only the NSA knows whose calls it monitored, and it's not saying.

So the NSA won't talk and the court won't make it - the government invoked the state secrets doctrine, which allows officials to withhold evidence that they contend would compromise national security if it were exposed.

The plaintiffs and their American Civil Liberties Union lawyers should appeal. When an administration is arguably violating federal law and the Constitution, the courts should never go willingly to the sidelines. Someone has to step up here, and if the courts won't, then Congress must.

Huffington Post "Standing to Sue"

How Courts May Subvert the Constitution

Alice Moore Batchelder

Julia Smith Gibbons

To what degree shall this decision be applied?

What about instances where there's a definitely suggestive time-line of politically motivated criminal law enforcement, but alas a lack of allowable discovery, as well as the police video being "just grey static"?

By Anne Broache

Staff Writer, CNET News.com

Published: July 6, 2007, 1:30 PM PDT

In a setback for foes of a controversial Bush administration wiretapping program, a federal appeals court on Friday threw out an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit that alleged illicit snooping on Americans' calls and e-mails.

In a 2-1 decision (PDF), the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati dismissed a federal district court ruling from last August that found the National Security Agency's Terrorist Surveillance Program violated the U.S. Constitution and ordered it to stop. The majority's ruling did not address the legality of the program; rather, it tossed out the case on narrow procedural grounds.

The move marked the first time an appeals court has weighed in on the numerous pending challenges to the spy program. Friday's decision isn't expected to have any direct impact on two related cases pending in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and more than 40 others that have been consolidated for consideration in a San Francisco district court.

ACLU Legal Director Steven Shapiro said his organization had not ruled out petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court for another look at the 6th Circuit's action.

"As a result of today's decision, the Bush administration has been left free to violate the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which Congress adopted almost 30 years ago to prevent the executive branch from engaging in precisely this kind of unchecked surveillance," Shapiro said in a statement. "It is important to emphasize that the court today did not uphold the legality of the government's warrantless surveillance activity."

The ACLU and the journalists, scholars, criminal defense attorneys and Islamic-Americans it represented had argued that the NSA program, which came to light in a November 2005 New York Times report, was trampling on federal laws and the plaintiffs' constitutional rights to free speech and privacy.

Their arguments rested on what they called a "well-founded belief" that the government was tapping their regular overseas communications--some of which, because of the nature of the plaintiffs' professions, they have an ethical duty to keep confidential--without the necessary court approval.

Judges Alice Batchelder and Julia Smith Gibbons, both appointed by President Ronald Reagan, concluded in separate opinions that the parties that sued the NSA didn't have standing to bring their case in the first place. They ordered that the suit be sent back to a lower court and roundly dismissed.

The two judges' reasoning, which differs at times, boils down to one general result: the parties that sued the NSA hadn't shown adequate evidence that they have been "personally" subject to the eavesdropping program. Even if the plaintiffs had wanted to supply evidence to back such a claim, they would have been stymied by the government's assertion of its "state secrets" privilege, which permits the derailing of lawsuits that might otherwise lead to the disclosure of military secrets.

Ruling on NSA Warrantless Wiretapping

Ronald Lee Gilman, the dissenting Judge

http://thatslifeinthecity.blogspot.com/2007/07/ruling-on-nsa-warrantless-eavesdropping.html

While the two judges in the majority did not rule on the legality of the program, the third judge -- Judge Gilman -- agreed with Judge Taylor's finding that the President's program violated FISA. He thus wrote that he "would affirm its judgment," and he rejected the administration's standard two defenses for that behavior (i.e., (1) that Authorization For Use Of Military Force , (AUMF), implicitly authorized FISA violations and (2) the President has "inherent authority" under Article II to eavesdrop with no warrants). In fact, just as was true for Judge Taylor, Judge Gilman found that while the "standing" issue was a close one, the actual merits -- i.e., whether the President broke the law -- was not close:
The closest question in this case, in my opinion, is whether the plaintiffs have the standing to sue. Once past that hurdle, however, the rest gets progressively easier . . . .

See previous related blog entries:

Secret Surveillance Evidence Unsealed In AT&T Spying Case

Bush Asks To Expand Spy Power

AT&T Says NSA Spying 'Too Secret' For Court

Justice Department Inspector General To Review Domestic Spying Program

ACLU Slams Senate Judiciary Committee’s Approval Of NSA Spying Bills

New Republican Bill Says Bush Spy Program Is Legal And Puts Pressure On Journalists

Domestic Spying Inquiry Killed

Pentagon Admits Spying On Gay Groups

Republicans Kill Request For Spy Program Inquiry

Reminder: Monday Is Wiretap The Internet Day

HOW THE NSA WARRANTLESS WIRETAP SYSTEM WORKS

Justice Department Will Appeal NSA Wiretap Ruling

Federal Judge Orders Wiretaps To Stop

Did New York Times Know About Wiretaps Before 2004 Election?

When It Comes To Questions About Government Wiretapping, "Trust Us" Isn't Good Enough

Appeals Court Backs Bush On Wiretaps

Court Skeptical Of FCC On Broadband Wiretap Access

U.S. Defends New Internet Wiretap Rules

Does New Presidential Directive Give Bush Dictatorial Power?

Bush Moves Closer Toward Martial Law And Dictatorship

Bush Takes One Giant Step Forward Towards Dictatorship

Former Supreme Court Judge Warns That U.S. May Be Heading Towards Dictatorship

American Bar Association Task Force Says Bush's Bill-Signing Statements Are Violating The Constitution

King George Bush?

Justice Department Audit Finds FBI Misused Patriot Act Powers

Bush Power Under Consideration Of Supreme Court

Republican Jon Kyl Revealed To Be Secret Blocker Of 'Open Government' Bill

2,176 Secret Warrants Issued In 2006

NSA Says It's Too Secret To Be Sued

Secret U.S. Program Tracks Global Bank Transfers

NSA Has Been Secretly Collecting Phone Call Records Of Millions Of Americans

How Courts Subvert the Constitution

Court ruling authorizes warrantless Web snooping

By Greg Moran UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

July 10, 2007

Federal agents do not need a search warrant to find out the Web page addresses people visit or the e-mail addresses they correspond with, a federal appeals court has ruled in a case involving an Escondido drug lab.

The decision by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals hands law enforcement a powerful surveillance tool that it can employ with virtually no check or balance or judicial oversight, legal experts said.

It was the first time a federal court has decided the constitutionality of government surveillance techniques that capture the “to” and “from” addresses of e-mails sent by individuals, and the unique addresses of Web pages that an individual visits.

Known as Internet Protocol, or IP, addresses, they are a sequence of numbers that serve as a kind of street address for Web sites.

In their decision on Friday, the judges ruled that individuals have no privacy expectation when it comes to e-mail or IP addresses because they should know that all of their communications are going through a third party -- the user's Internet service provider.

By voluntarily turning over information to third parties, Internet users are therefore giving up any expectation of privacy, the court said.

The court likened the tactic to the use of a “pen register” -- a device that records the numbers dialed from a specific phone. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1979 ruled that police did not have to get a search warrant for that activity.

But one legal expert said that analogy ignores the fact that more information can be gleaned from an IP address than from a phone number.

“It overlooks the important differences between these kinds of communications,” said Shaun Martin, a law professor at the University of San Diego School of Law.

“Getting a list of IP addresses reveals far, far more information than a pen register ever would. And if it didn't, the government wouldn't be looking to get this information in the first place,” he said.

The 1979 decision said people should not expect privacy when it came to the numbers they dialed because the numbers went through a third party -- the phone company's switching equipment that completed a call.

The Supreme Court also ruled the pen register tactic was legal because police were collecting just the phone number and not the content of the communication.

In this case, the judges applied that logic to computer users. Simply gathering the electronic addresses is like collecting phone numbers, or reading addresses on envelopes and packages sent through the mail, Judge Raymond Fisher wrote in his opinion. Courts have held that obtaining information from the outside of mail without a warrant is also allowable.

Fisher said that by using the IP address tactic, the government is getting only basic information. It can learn who the person is e-mailing or what Web sites are being viewed, but does not “find out the contents of the messages or the particular pages on the Web sites the person viewed.”

The judge cautioned that the ruling only goes so far, “and does not imply that more intrusive techniques or techniques that reveal more content information” are acceptable.

The ruling said surveillance that tracks the Web pages a person visits on a site “might be more constitutionally problematic.” So while the government is now free to know that someone visited, for example, signonsandiego.com, it might be barred from knowing a user went to the Web page displaying this story.

Still, Martin said, many people who send an e-mail or visit a Web site probably expect that they are doing so in private.

He said under the ruling, the government can obtain such information from Internet service companies about anyone -- not just those suspected of a crime -- without a warrant.

The ruling opens the door to wider government surveillance, Martin said.

“The reason this is a novel issue is that up to now, police don't do this that much,” he said. “One of the important things about this decision is that once you say it is OK to do it, you are going to see police do it a lot more.”

The decision came in the case of Dennis Alba, a former Carlsbad man convicted in 2003 of leading a drug ring that produced massive amounts of the drug Ecstasy at an Escondido lab.

At the time, authorities said it was the largest Ecstasy operation they had seen -- pouring out 1.5 million pills a month and netting an estimated $10 million in profit per month.

In May 2001, authorities began to snoop on Alba's e-mail and Internet activity. They later used the information to obtain a search warrant to further investigate the case.

Alba's lawyer, Michael Crowley, objected to the tactics but was rebuffed by the trial judge. Crowley said he would seek a review of the decision by a larger panel of the appeals court.

“It's too important a decision to be decided by a three-judge panel,” he said. “It just gives the government unbridled authority to do what they want. There is no judicial oversight, no check or balance.”

Alba's appeal was joined with that of his co-leader of the drug ring, Mark Forrester. While upholding Alba's 30-year sentence, the judges reversed Forrester's identical prison term because of errors by the trial judge.

Todd Robinson, the federal prosecutor on the case, said the government will retry Forrester. Because Forrester's retrial is pending, the prosecutor declined to comment on the appeals court ruling on Alba's case.

This violates not only the 4th Amendment, but also the 8th Amendment with its 30 year sentence: hence making the former almost a dead letter as the latter.

How Criminal Law Enforcement Nullifies the 4th Amendment

Target people by stating that they have committed a traffic offense, regardless of whether that’s true.

Handcuff people immediately upon ordering them out of their vehicles, and later justify this by stating that the person tried to escape, whether or not that’s true

Use anything as an excuse for a “drug” dog, such as a tissue in one’s pocket with staph infected band aids, and NO contraband as “marijuana” for being soft.

Have a “drug” dog that does not visible sign, (e.g. not by barking and scratching) after being placed inside of car, and NOT walked around the car, and later claim that the dog “signed” after walking around the car, whether or not true. Such a dog becomes automatic probable cause whether or not it actually smells anything as if it is trained to “sign”, it can do so for a treat.

Take key from person by force, and later state that it had been left in the ignition.

To cover up the testilying , ensure that the police video is NOT working.

Bear False Wittness. TESTILIE!!! Lie under oath! The politicians bore false wittness when they passed these laws -- Cannibas 0 deaths; Tobacco 40 million worldwide annually -- so you must do the same.

The Ends Justify the Means and White is Black and Black is White whenever we say.

U.S. President G.W. Bush throwing the 1st ball of the baseball season

G.W. Bush, Pope John Paul II, and Laura Bush

U.S. President G.W. Bush, Cardinal Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts

I made a post regarding McCarrick only 2 weeks prior to my August 5, 2006 ambush

Karl Rove, G.W. Bush, Pope Benedict

Nationals Baseball Stadium Blocks the South Capitol Mall


http://www.whitehouse.gov/baseball/2005/11.html

How Criminal Law Enforcement Nullifies the 1st Amendment

Target people based upon “information” – aka orders w/o any detailed info to distinguish whether political.

“Research” people without looking at their writings, hence failing to look at the possibility of politically motivated surveillance and enforcement.

And then violate the 4th Amendment, testilie, and claim that the police video was "just grey static".

How Courts and State Legislatures Nullify the Constitution

Accept police testimony without reservation, creating situation intrinsically anti-defendant via discouraging counter testimony from defendants, while nullifying the constitutional presumption of innocence..

Don’t question instances where the police video is supposedly “just grey static”.

Don’t require working police video.

Don’t allow discovery of such things as inter-agency memos or even police reports from the arresting officers.

My August 5, 2006 Ambush Police Video "just grey static"

"The defendant was confrontational with the officers. He asked why they stopped him repeatedly. The defendant immediately requested a lawyer.

Originally the officers anticipated that the traffic stop would be video-taped. However, when they went to review the tape from the police cruiser, they discovered that it was not working properly and that it was just grey static."

COMMONWEALTH'S RESPONSE TO DEFENDANT"S REQUEST FOR DISCOVERY, page 1, COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA v. DOUGLAS WILLINGER CASE NO. FE2007-181

Somehow I am not surprised for this apparently politically motivated illegal stop and search, with at least 5 police cars and 23 black suited police, including Federal.

Note that the Commonwealth of Virginia does not require police video.

And my attorney advised me that the judge simply believes the police, hence there is no point to my testifying.

Apparantly, criminal courts lack safe-guards against the abuse of warrantless wiretapping through U.S. Homeland Security as revenge for such writings as this, this, and this, in my blog spotlighting the blacked-out issue of the abortion of what would have been Washington, D.C.'s South Capitol Mall.

FOLLOW THE LINKS for this continuing story!