Protesters tell police spies, 'Back off'
By Greg Butterfield
New York
Hundreds of protesters who were arrested on
anti-war demonstrations here from Feb. 15 to April 15 were
subjected to illegal and unconstitutional questioning about
their political beliefs and associations, the New York Civil
Liberties Union has charged.
Many protesters contacted the NYCLU, which lodged a formal
complaint with the New York Police Department on their behalf.
On April 17 civil rights lawyers took the matter to a federal
court judge who had earlier agreed to ease restrictions on
police spying and intelligence gathering.
On April 8 Judge Charles S. Haight had sided with the NYPD's
claim that police "needed greater latitude to conduct terrorism
investigations" after 9/11.
But for nearly two months before this loosening of police
restrictions, arrested protesters say, they were being
questioned by detectives from the department's Intelligence
Division--also known as the "Red Squad" for its historic
persecution of communists and other progressives.
The detectives asked questions from an official
"Demonstration Debriefing Form." Protesters were asked what
political party or organization they belonged to; if they had
been to previous demonstrations; what school they attended;
their views on Palestine and Israel; and even whether they
believed the U.S. should have participated in World War II.
The NYPD compiled a computer database on these
individuals.
When this was brought into public view, the NYPD claimed it
had stopped asking the questions and had destroyed the database
and paper forms. Police Com mis sioner Ray Kelly said he knew
nothing about it.
There was no independent confirmation of these claims.
Arrested demonstrators will still be asked about their
political affiliations, NYPD spokesperson Michael O'Looney
said. Answers will be listed in a "tally of organizations"
rather than individuals.
Civil rights lawyers say that's unconstitutional as well,
and that the questioning demonstrates "an intelligence division
that is out of control."
Denver victory bucks national trend
The New York case isn't an isolated incident. It's part of
the Bush administration's war at home against poor and
working-class people, communities of color, students and
progressives.
"Under the proposed Domestic Secu rity Enhancement Act of
2003, the Justice Department would support communities in
terminating state law enforcement consent decrees from before
Sept. 11, 2001, that limit police from gathering information
about individuals and organizations," the Associated Press
reported April 6.
Chicago, Los Angeles and Seattle are among the major cities
planning to undo restrictions on police spying and infiltration
of political groups. A state Republican lawmaker in Oregon has
even introduced a bill that would classify protesters as
"terrorists" with a mandatory 25-years-to-life prison sentence.
(Reuters, April 2)
And naked police repression is on the increase.
In Oakland, Calif., anti-war demon stra tors and bystanders,
including longshore workers, were attacked with wooden and
rubber bullets, concussion grenades and tear gas April 7.
Two hundred protesters at a legal, permitted march in
Chicago were arrested en masse on March 20.
At the Washington, D.C., anti-war protest April 12, Marc
Frucht from Mil wau kee was held down and beaten repeatedly
with a nightstick by police after he tried to photograph a
woman being arrested.
Modest restrictions on police spying and abuse were won in
the 1970s and 1980s, after decades of state-sponsored terror
directed at progressive movements. But it's a myth that police
ever stopped targeting the left.
Take Denver, for example. On April 17, the city and the
American Civil Liberties Union reached an out-of-court
settlement restricting cops from photographing, recording
license plate numbers, or intercepting email of protest
organizers.
Fifty years of police spying came to light just last year.
The American Friends Ser vice Committee, a pacifist group
affiliated with the Quaker religious sect, was listed as a
"criminal extremist group" by the Denver police, along with a
Chiapas solidarity group. (AP, April 17)
Under the settlement, police would be limited to "gathering
information about serious criminal activity." There will be
independent oversight for the first two years. (Reuters, April
17)
But no one in the department will be punished. And so far
the Denver cops are refusing to turn over their files, claiming
they will destroy the papers "in a year."
"I'm disappointed that no one to this day has been
disciplined, transferred or fired for assembling the current
files," said Native activist Glenn Morris, the subject of one
of the 3,200 police files. "This intelligence was gathered in
direct violation of the Constitution." (Denver Post, April
18)
Reprinted from the May 1, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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