FBI Accused of Abusing Criminal Database

Peace protesters were unable to leave the country to speak in Canada because their names had been added to a database of criminals. There's a serious due-process violation here because a listing in this database is equivalent to an "infamous" conviction. "'The FBI's placing of peace activists on an international criminal database is blatant political intimidation of US citizens opposed to Bush administration policies,' says Colonel Wright, who was also Deputy US Ambassador in four countries. 'The Canadian government should certainly not accept this FBI database as the criteria for entering the country... The list is supposed to be for felony and serious misdemeanor offenses. We don't qualify — it's for sex offenders, foreign fugitives, gang violence and terrorist organizations, people who are on parole...'"

Comments

In other words...

[InvisblePinkUnicorn]

"If you're simply charged with a single misdemeanor from a long time ago and it doesn't fall into a higher category, it is unlikely that you'll be inadmissible for that single offence."

In other words, Canada will only accept people who have not recently been arrested for lying on the ground in nonviolent protest. On the other hand, if you regularly do this, as was common during the US civil rights movement, Canada wants nothing to do with you. If they were still around today (and their various arrests were more recent), could MLK or Rosa Parks get into Canada? How about their lesser-known followers?

Re:s/freedom/security/g

[SIIHP]

"I'm vastly more intelligent than the average US redneck."

But apparently far more racist.