43 Worst Civil Liberties Nightmares That Came True In 2017
"These aren’t predictions at all. These are all stories that took place in 2017."
Privacy Complaints Mount Over Phone Searches at U.S. Border Since 2011
"Smartphones and other personal electronics contain vastly more private information than suitcases. The American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have filed a lawsuit in Boston arguing that a warrant should be required to search such devices at the border. Last week, the Trump administration asked a judge to dismiss the case. The lawsuit comes amid a surge in agents looking through — and sometimes copying data from — cellphones and laptops. Midway through fiscal year 2017, Customs and Border Protection was on pace to search 30,000 travelers’ electronics — more than tripling the annual number by that agency since 2015."
Rebellious Jurors Make the World a Better Place
"Gun owners and their sympathizers are as busily at work in the jury box as pot smokers."
The Deep State’s Christmas Present to America: Surveillance That Never Ends
"The Trump Administration has been actively lobbying Congress to reauthorize Section 702 in its entirety. Now, according to The Intercept, Trump is actively considering a proposal to establish his own global, private spy network that would circumvent official U.S. intelligence agencies and answer directly to the White House. If approved, this would be yet another secret government agency carrying out secret surveillance and counterintelligence, funded by a secret black ops budget that by its very nature does away with transparency, bypasses accountability and completely eludes any form of constitutionality."
Bovard: Yes, the FBI is America’s secret police
"In order to boost the credibility of the FBI’s investigations of the Trump team, much of the media is whitewashing the bureau’s entire history. But the FBI has been out of control almost since its birth."
Arizona Citizens Tracked In REAL ID Facial Recognition Database
"But the use of the system to prevent identity theft isn’t what people are worried about; the problem is the lack of oversight in government programs that allows anyone with access to look into the database. As such, state-run facial recognition databases are dangerous and can lead down a slippery slope to allow other operations the technology wasn’t intended for."
Congress Needs to Put a Stop to Asset Forfeiture
"Revenues generated through forfeiture may be spent with virtually no oversight. Funds distributed to local or state agencies via the equitable sharing program are similarly beyond the reach of state or local lawmakers. Perhaps this lack of accountability explains how funds supposedly reserved for 'law enforcement purposes' wind up getting spent on margarita machines, training trips to Hawaii, and chrome accents for Harley Davidson motorcycles."
How police used a traffic stop to take $91,800 from an innocent man
"He only got a $25 ticket for improperly wearing his seat belt and a warning for 'lane use.' But Wyoming law enforcement officers found and eventually seized the $91,800 in cash, as it was hidden in a speaker cabinet — by getting Parhamovich, under what he claims was duress, to sign away his interest in the money through a waiver. He has since tried to get his money back. But state law enforcement officials have rejected his pleas. Responding to a request for records related to Parhamovich’s case, state officials said they consider the cash 'abandoned.' The state has even moved to forfeiture the money without notifying Parhamovich of the relevant court hearing until after it happened."
NSA Secretly Helped Convict Defendants in U.S. Courts
"The undisclosed use of warrantless surveillance to win prosecutions is also troubling from a constitutional standpoint, foreclosing a rare opportunity to discover Section 702 abuses and challenge the law, which civil liberties advocates have argued is unconstitutional."
At Guantánamo, a Death Penalty Case Without a Death Penalty Lawyer
"The judge’s departure from the rules, which require learned counsel at every part of a capital prosecution, is inexplicable. Even beyond the binding military commission rules, the American Bar Association’s guidelines for capital cases have long explained that the unique and complex labyrinth of capital trial preparation and investigation requires qualified death penalty counsel represent the defendant at every stage of the proceedings. Nonetheless, Judge Spath suggested that the junior defense counsel should, alone, stand in the place of learned counsel and a team with deep knowledge of the voluminous issues that the case raises."
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