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NubiWan
Skeptic Friend
USA
424 Posts |
 Posted - 09/15/2003 : 10:36:57
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Well, this shouldn't really surprise anyone, but confess a sense of disappointment in having my distrust, confirmed so quickly. Am old enough to recall having near complete trust in the aims and intentions of our government. Umm.., guess that would have been pre-sixties, or pre-Nixon. What has become of US
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"In the two years since law enforcement agencies gained fresh powers to help them track down and punish terrorists, police and prosecutors have increasingly turned the force of the new laws not on al-Qaida cells but on people charged with common crimes."
"Civil liberties and legal defense groups are bothered by the string of cases, and say the government soon will be routinely using harsh anti-terrorism laws against run-of-the-mill lawbreakers.
"Within six months of passing the Patriot Act, the Justice Department was conducting seminars on how to stretch the new wiretapping provisions to extend them beyond terror cases," said Dan Dodson, a spokesman for the National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys. "They say they want the Patriot Act to fight terrorism, then, within six months, they are teaching their people how to use it on ordinary citizens."
Prosecutors aren't apologizing.
Attorney General John Ashcroft completed a 16-city tour this week defending the Patriot Act as key to preventing a second catastrophic terrorist attack. Federal prosecutors have brought more than 250 criminal charges under the law, with more than 130 convictions or guilty pleas.
The law, passed two months after the Sept. 11 attacks, erased many restrictions that had barred the government from spying on its citizens, granting agents new powers to use wiretaps, conduct electronic and computer eavesdropping and access private financial data."
DAVID B. CARUSO, Associated Press Writer
Sunday, September 14, 2003
©2003 Associated Press
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/09/14/national1259EDT0480.DTL&type=printable
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