[CPProt.net] Patriot Act debate grows after probe details scope

[MSN CPPnet (Ton Cremers)]

Patriot Act debate grows after probe details scope
  
By Michael Dinan
Staff Writer

November 13, 2005

A Fairfield County man has been identified as the library official at the
center of a controversy surrounding the federal government's expanded
investigative powers under the USA Patriot Act.

Trumbull resident George Christian, executive director of a company that
manages digital records for 36 Connecticut libraries, this summer refused to
comply with an FBI demand -- made through a so-called "national security
letter" -- for user information of a public computer terminal, The
Washington Post reported last week.

Christian's employer, Wind-sor-based Library Connection Inc., has filed suit
to publicly protest the FBI demand -- the first-ever challenge to a gag
order contained within the Patriot Act itself.

The 132-page federal law, which Congress passed a month after the Sept. 11,
2001, terrorist attacks, grants FBI officials unprecedented leeway in
investigations. The revelations that the FBI issues about 30,000 national
security letters every year -- pieced together by the Post -- has refired
passions among librarians opposed to controversial provisions of the Patriot
Act.

Alice Knapp, director of public services at the Ferguson Library in
Stamford, said the Post's recent article is circulating quickly among staff
members.

"We're all trading it back and forth here," said Knapp, president of the
Connecticut Library Association which represents more than 1,000 library
staff, donors, patrons and trustees in the state. "When I saw the sheer
volume of the national security letters, I was absolutely shocked. Totally
shocked."

Under the Patriot Act, more than 60 FBI field inspectors may issue national
security letters, which can include demands for information about an
individual's residence, telephone, e-mail, Internet use, income, purchasing,
travel, investment and reading records. Issuance of a national security
letter does not require that a person is suspected of terrorist activity --
only that he or she is "relevant" to an investigation.

Information gathered through national security letters is permanently stored
in a federal databank and available to every level of law enforcement,
though individuals under investigation never know they're being tracked. The
letters themselves receive neither judicial nor congressional review. Since
the Patriot Act was enacted four years ago, the Post reported, the Justice
Department has provided congressional committees with just three strictly
statistical reports on the use of national security letters. The Bush
administration has never acknowledged a single instance in which the letters
led to terrorists, the Post reported.

Knapp said she's concerned about the government's wide reign in issuing
national security letters.

"When you're living in a free democratic society, the government's ability
to do this is chilling and it's a very dampening pool on our ability to have
unfettered access to information. . . . It's a very Orwellian component of
the Patriot Act," Knapp said.

According to the Post, the national security letter Christian received
demanded "all subscriber information, billing information and access logs
for any person" using a particular computer.

On Nov. 2, Knapp sat in a federal appeals court in lower Manhattan court to
listen in on oral arguments on Christian's case. The case came before a
three-judge panel after the government appealed a U.S. District Court
judge's ruling in September that the Patriot Act's gag order violated
Christian's -- and Library Connection's -- First Amendment rights. The ACLU
is representing Library Connection. The panel has not yet ruled on the
appeal.

Information that would show which Connecticut library the FBI wanted records
from remains under seal. Three dozen central Connecticut libraries are
served by Library Connection, according to the company's Web site.

Christian declined to comment, citing the Patriot Act's gag order.

"It's the whole organization that's under the gag," he said.

The gag order is one of two Patriot Act provisions now under judicial
review.

In addition to Christian's case, the ACLU is hoping that the federal appeals
court upholds a lower court ruling in New York that found national security
letters themselves unconstitutional. The ACLU is also representing the New
York entity, whose identity is sealed.

Both cases pit advocates of First and Fourth Amendment rights -- for free
speech and protection against unreasonable searches and seizures -- against
proponents of the Patriot Act who claim that the FBI's expanded powers are a
necessary safeguard against terrorism.

One of those proponents, Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., says that the
Patriot Act provides necessary anti-terrorism safeguards.

"I believe that there is no way to have proper deterrents without getting
these documents," Shays said. "I happen to believe that there will be a day,
maybe sooner than later, where failure to get proper documents can mean a
disaster for our country, and that's where I put my weight."

Even Shays, however, expressed surprise at the number of national security
letters issued in the last four years, as reported by the Post.

"I am concerned that there are so many letters, and I'd like to know why
there are so many," Shays said.

Shays said he spoke with Justice Department officials last week and found
out that FBI authorities seeking library records aren't necessarily trying
to uncover information about public computer users. Rather, Shays said,
because libraries themselves sometimes operate as Internet service
providers, they house information that may identify individuals that have
sent threatening letters.

"They're not looking to get at somebody's books, necessarily," said Shays,
who admitted that he didn't know the specifics of the FBI's request in
Connecticut. "Some libraries are conduits for e-mails."

Shays added that he feels the Patriot Act provides more judicial oversight
for national security than courts normally do for criminal cases.

In Christian's case, according to the Post, FBI officials were seeking
information from a single computer terminal.

Knapp said the specificity of the national security letter issued to
Christian doesn't make her feel any better.

"How do you know when you go into a library that the computer you use is not
taken out later to research later? It has the same effect in my mind," Knapp
said. "There's still the government looking over your shoulder." 

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