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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...'"
To me, it is like the boy who cries wolf. If the FBI puts out "criminal" warnings on too many peace protestors, then the international criminal database will start ignoring FBI criminal warnings, allowing true criminals to exit the country and get away from prosecution. Way to go boys!
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
FBI Director Edgeworth had no comment.
If it can be abused, it will. No news here. I'm sure a DNA data base will never be abused either. America is becoming a fascist nation. It's not there yet, but it's heading in that direction.
The thing is, not everyone who gets arrested normally gets put on that list. It's not supposed to be a comprehensive list of everyone who's ever been arrested, or everyone who's ever been charged, or even everyone who's ever been convicted of a crime. It's supposed to be a list of dangerous criminals. Now it's not.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
A few years ago, a US anti-war activist named Scott Parkin was seized in the streets of Melbourne, Australia, on his way to a seminar on "non-violent resistance", detained for a week and deported as a "threat to national security", on the basis of intelligence which has still not been made public. Could this database have been the intelligence in question?
... I was not that long ago thinking about taking up a job in the US and moving there! I'm glad I didn't, as I really don't like what the US has become over the past few years under the Bush administration. I hope the next election will bring some change, but I fear Americans will just elect another candidate based on whatever the media is feeding them, not what the candidate is actually about. Still I am hopefull enough Americans have learned their lesson, and will take a different course! I've been to the US many times, and the people I've met are great, too bad some rotten apples managed to take control of the country!
09 f9 11 02 9d 74 e3 5b d8 41 56 c5 63
Congratulations all you non-voters who have kept these people in power for so long. Now that everyone is safe, don't you feel much better?
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
So let me see if I have this straight:
1) The were denied entry on Aug 19 cause they have a criminal conviction.
2) They tried again 2 weeks later (without filling the paperwork), and were denied entry.
3) American Citizens are trying to tell the Canadian Government what their criteria for entry should be?
If there is a problem with the FBI, focus on that. Do not (under any circumstances) tell my government how to run our border - it is none of your damn business.
Yes I'm pro-peace - but I don't respect stupid political stunts with bs conclusions.
Anon
"The Canadian government should certainly not accept this FBI database as the criteria for entering the country"
..."
"It's outrageous that Canada is turning away peacemakers
Fix your own government and your own government database before you complain about someones else's government.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
As a sidenote, yes, Canada has recently been getting extremely picky about letting people with criminal records into the country, even petty crimes and decades old DUIs.
From Article:Huh? What? When did we annex Canada? I'm sure there's some Canadians that this statement would piss off - they're quite capable of running their own country, they don't need Bush's help. Besides, why would Bush be working to make it more difficult for US Citizens to enter Canada?IE you're troublemakers, therefore the border agents were quite right to deny you entry.It looks like it's proper for you to be listed:
1. Individuals who have been fingerprinted and whose criminal history
record information has been obtained.
Any arrest is generally for at least a 'serious misdemeanor'. Minor misdemeanors get a ticket and a court date.
I don't read AC A human right
...if they want to have their names removed from the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database, which appears to be what the Canadian officials pulled. The NCIC "is provided by the FBI, federal, state, local and foreign criminal justice agencies, and authorized courts." Thus, the NCIC is made up of FBI data and data provided to the FBI by other government organizations. To correct a record in this database, "the subject of the requested record shall request the appropriate arresting agency, court, or correctional agency to initiate action necessary to correct any stated inaccuracy in subject's record or provide the information needed to make the record complete." Unfortunately, accessing the record in the first place can be a challenge; it looks like it requires being fingerprinted and making the request through a law enforcement agency that has access to the record. More information is available here.
http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/doj/fbi/is/ncic.htmI worked as an Immigration Officer with the Canada Border Services Agency. My duties included evaluating whether individuals were admissible to Canada based on the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. The following is my personal opinion and I don't represent the Government of Canada. Also, this is not legal advice and I accept no liability.
Yes, we do have access to NCIC the FBI criminal database and we do use it as supporting evidence when we're determining if someone is inadmissible to Canada based on criminality. However, I never seen anything in the database that is not: (a) an arrest record, (b) a record of court proceedings, or (c) a warrrent/lookout/restraining order.
I can tell you that "listing in this database" is only equivalent to "a conviction" when it says exactly what you were charged and convicted of. For example, it will show you were arrested for Assault on such and such date. The next record will show that you appeared in court on such and such a date. It will then show the judge's opinion, followed by a sentence if you were found guilty.
The only ambiguity arises when the offence is not a serious misdemeanor. The problem occurs because it is up to the individual state court's to file the necessary paperwork with NCIC to have the information put into the database. Sometimes these clerks are busy and backlogged and never get around to inputting the judgement of the court into the database. In that instance, it will show you were arrested for "driving while intoxicated" but will not show if you were found guilty or not guilty. In this case, the onus is on the individual entering Canada to prove that they are not inadmissible based on criminality. The reason is that we officers are making a decision on the balance of probabilities and having evidence of possible criminal activity usually outweighs the individual's word.
I have never had someone's criminal record simply say "Peace Activist" or something equally silly. Unless you were convicted of a criminal offence, or it's reasonable for me to believe you have, then you are not going to be refused entry for criminality.
The above may contain some errors or it may be unclear. I don't have time to proofread it before work.
There's a serious due-process violation here because a listing in this database is equivalent to an "infamous" conviction.
What does this sentence mean?
I'm pretty sure the rules are that no one should be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process. Liberty doesn't extend to cross-border travel in general because nations have the inherent authority to control their borders. No life or property was involved.
So what is the author talking about? It's completely unclear. I could guess it's just generic whining, but I'd really rather know the answer to the question: What is the author talking about?
The Canadian government should certainly not accept this FBI database as the criteria for entering the country
Yeah. Why wouldn't Canada want huge numbers of protesters in their country causing trouble? They're really missing out on all that valuable, constructive protesting that these paragons of civilization would be engaging in.
Canada is no different than anywhere else. Almost any government would shut out these protesters if they could. In a practical sense, they are a useless pain in the ass. Canada figured out a legal way to solve part of their problem.
Another bad thing is that it seems that these people can't actually run the government well, they only they are capable of doing correctly is character assassination, whether that be republican political opponents or civil rights activists. They're fucking incompetent in doing everything else. How long must we endure this? Oh yeah, it's right here.
Now I wonder if the next president will reverse this trend? If you listen to the Republican candidates, all they seem to care about perpetuating the policies that are ruining our government. The democrats seem like they're more level-headed, but I wonder if they have the courage to change the status quo, because they haven't done a damn thing since gaining congress. Where's Roosevelt when you need him?
Gentlemen! You can't fight in here, this is the war room!
Oh, do shut the fuck up. Terrorists? Man, let's just throw that label on anyone whose speech we don't like. Disorderly conduct? "Oh bloody hell guvnah! Those people's conduct, it's disorderly!"
Do you just conveniently forget that the great moments of this nation's history were acts of resisting arrest, vandalism, and disorderly conduct".
Do you remember those damn Boston Tea Party Terrorists?
Do you remember when that pesky negro wouldn't learn her place?
What a sad day when I have to remind someone that not only was this country founded in protest, protests were still needed 200 years later because this nation still wasn't as great as it needed to be. You have zero concept of your nation's history, yet you have the nerve to suggest that resisting arrest is itself bad behavior?
Yeah, because theres nothing wrong with the concept of having to sneak into PUBLIC buildings where PUBLIC OFFICIALS have their meetings after being elected by their PUBLIC. If you can't immediately see whats wrong with that idea, then you should go move to some country like Sierra Leone because you have no goddamned idea what it means to live in a democracy, a nation OF THE PEOPLE.
And it's really depressing to note that even now, the majority of Americans see no problem with ripping up or ignoring international law and treaties, so long as they're told it's being done to "terrorists". On the contrary, Republican candidates are competing to make the most outraegously statement of support for the blatantly criminal action that is Guantanamo. Very, very sad (speaking as a non-American.)
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
Insofar as King, the memo regarding COINTELPRO against blacks said "The Counterintelligence Program is now being expanded to include 41 offices... For maximum effectiveness of the Counterintelligence Program, and to prevent wasted effort, long range goals are being set...Prevent the rise of a 'messiah' who could unify, and electrify, the militant black nationalist movement...King could be a very real contender for this position should he abandon his supposed 'obedience' to 'white, liberal doctrines'". This is simply a secret police, a political police, trying to undermine the democratic process in this country. I know old-timer activists from the 1960s who found out due to FOIAs that the FBI had tried to get them fired from their jobs by sending anonymous letters to their employers.
Then on Fox News they whine how the liberals shackled the CIA and FBI in the 1970s - they neglect to mention how Nixon's White House staff, including old CIA hands like Hunt, were doing things like breaking into the Democratic Party campaign headquarters at the Watergate hotel however. The CIA was undermining democratic governments not only in places like Chile, but in Australia (Whitlam affair) and Italy (P2, Gladio). Even after the FBI was supposedly cleaned up in the 1970s, Reagan had them trying to seduce nuns (who were unhappy about nuns being raped and hacked up in El Salvador, as well as the archbishop being assassinated) involved in CISPES. Now with the Patriot Act etc., all of the constraints and watchdog functions over these organizations have disappeared.
Protesters == troublemakers, huh?
Do you even know any of your country's history? If your founding fathers hadn't protested your country would never have been born. Sometimes people have to make a stand based on their morals, and if they have the balls to do it non-violently then they deserve your respect.
It's quite simple - any country that treats dissenters as criminals is in danger of becoming a totalitarian state.
And personally - I don't think a DUI can EVER be considered petty.
Having seen video of various protests back in the '60s, Those sound like accurate crimes to charge peace protestors with.
Did abuse happen? On both sides.
Still, by my understanding, if a conviction for an old reformed hippy showed up from back in the '60s, it'd be up to the Canadian authorities as to whether they allow entry or kick it back to the appeal/reform process.
I don't read AC A human right
"I noticed that they didn't deny having been arrested."
Bingo, you just found the way to supress all discent. For example, someone has the gall to wear an anti-bush shirt to a public event? Arrest them, and they will always be treated as a criminal in the future, making their voice that much harder to be heard! Just what we want!
"why would Bush be working to make it more difficult for US Citizens to enter Canada?" Remember free speech zones? Anything that makes it harder for Bush to hear those opposed to him is good in his eyes.
"IE you're troublemakers, therefore the border agents were quite right to deny you entry."
So in your puny world, anyone that tries to exercise their freedom and hold the government accountable is a troublemaker and deserves to have his activities surpressed? Karl is that you? You are such a tool. By the way, do you work for the White House, and just plant this comment?
Years ago, I think it was during the first Clinton campaign, a russian reporter commented that with the two candidates, the requirement that questions be submitted in advance, the carefully screened events etc etc, it was becoming more and more like the USSR elections he used to "report" on before the collapse.
This is NOT a slam against the US, most countries are going through this at the moment. It isn't even about any polical leaning, Labour in Great Britian is supposed to be left. It just seems as if we seem destined to go to more and more restrictions on our freedoms, in the name of protecting us. Except that it never seems to be about us, but rather the people already in power.
That is not what has me worried. What worries me is how little the comman man cares about it all. Bread and Circusses, it really seems true. Give them reality tv, and the masses will keep queit. Move people vote on Idol then on elections. Starlets get more news coverage then the war.
What I think has happened is that we have led the press become too commercial, they were supposed to be the watchdog of the goverment, instead we allowed them to become slaves to the dollar, worried about ever increasing viewing figures/profits instead of reporting the news.
Paranoids don't help, sometimes I think they are a plot in themselves, by coming up with insane theories while the simplest is simply that the fast majority of news outlets are owned by just a handfull of people.
And who is going to report on the press going bad? The press? It is all a simply slippery slope. Where does it end? The rush to have scoop first, leads news outlet after news ooutlet to report stories that later turn out to be false. Some people even put scams up in order to prove this and NEVER FAIL. Does the media do anything with it? Holland has had one recently, how many reporters/editors were fired? None.
The first time a reporter agreed not to ask a question duing a press conference that led to now questions having to be asked in advance all the way to staged FEMA press-conference.
But hey, there is good news, in the 2008 elections, old USSR reporters can relive the old times.
The dutch news is a prime example, the intros have gotten longer and flashier, total airtime has shrunk, what time remains is now wasted on pre-views and recaps of things that are in that same news program, more time is spend on weather and sports. It was during gulf war 1 that the dutch news had a 5 minute segment of the queen opening some art exhibit. The US got Britney Spears, we got Maxima, no dear news editor, a new royal being born is NOT headline news, it is at best a human interest story, worth no more then a 20 second segment at the end of the news.
If you want to see why democracy is failing, watch the news. It will become painfully clear when you realize that the actuall NEWS content is starting to approach zero.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
These people were labeled and punished...
It's not a punishment. Canada has no obligation to let people in the country. If they grant you entry, it's essentially a privilege.
If I were a Canadian, I'd say the list was no longer dependable and demand my government quit using it.
If I were Canadian, I'd cheer the result.
Maybe the list isn't supposed to be used for this particular result. So perhaps create another, even better list -- "Troublemakers who have nothing to offer" -- to keep protesters and activists out.
I'm sure there are dangerous criminals on that FBI list in addition to the annoying protesters though. I'm guessing Canadians don't want to start importing sex offenders and armed robbers so they may want to think twice before they oppose using that FBI list.
As a citizen of the USA, I hope Canada does start importing our protesters and sex offenders and gives them generous social benefits to try to get them to stay in Canada.
Speaking as someone who has used NCIC extensively (See this thread http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=344011&cid=21169011 further down) ...
There are many people on the NCIC just because they have a single misdemeanor arrest. However, a record of an arrest usually won't make you inadmissible to Canada on it's own, though it certainly doesn't help. See the other thread for way more information.
This story is tagged with "opinionpiece" - the latest BS campaign from the rightwing political PR industry. When these people refer to something controversial in the public discussion as "it's just an opinion piece", they're implying that it should be ignored. Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck offer a demented police state to tens of millions of viewers? Don't worry, "it's just an opinion piece". Al Gore says scientists are shocked at how much faster the Arctic melted this year than their worst fears? Don't worry, "it's just an opinion piece".
Yes, it's an opinion piece. The opinions based on solid facts, held together with solid logic, especially the ones offering compassion with people like you who got screwed (so you could be next), those opinion pieces are important. The Constitution is an opinion piece.
Some opinion pieces, that aren't derived from rigorous and fair thinking, are indeed worthless. But when you ignore an explanation of how the FBI is framing innocent activists with crimes that shut down their rights, you're helping destroy those rights. When you push the "ignore the opinion piece" line, you're leading the destruction.
Yeah, everyone's got one. But like asses, some are better than others, some should never see the light of day, and some should be prized by anyone who can get a look.
--
make install -not war
The biggest problem here is that the Executive branch has all the agencies, and whenever the leftists win a bigger government vote all the extra people in the bigger government are at the Executive branch's disposal.
Congress has some support staff, as do the justices of the Supreme Court. There are roughly two million civilian personnel of the federal government outside the Postal Service. For 535 people or 9 people to hold responsible two million individuals who are neither elected by nor directly responsible to the people is a bit ludicrous. The sheer size of the Executive branch makes accountability and the notion of checks and balances pretty difficult, even with the 94 federal district courts involved.
The Judiciary simply must be larger or the Executive smaller in order for the people to be properly served by checks and balances. In fact, I'd say the Judiciary really needs to be larger and account for more of the federal budget simply in order to guarantee a speedy trial as the sixth amendment promises while not putting undue strain on the court to shorten previous trials. Perhaps civil cases could be heard by a separate set of judges in each district specializing in civil cases, but I digress.
In any case, I'd think the huge Executive branch, with its apparent penchant for shifting blame and covering things up, is much too large right now for the other branches to balance it enough.
Do we really need 2 million people to provide federal government services to 303 million citizens on top of all the 16 million state, county, and city personnel providing services as well? In 2000, 19 million or so people were government employees (it doesn't say whether that includes revenue-generating government agencies like the Post Service). That's over 6% of the population living on taxes and borrowed money who are not elected, or over 14% of the total work force. I fail to see how that is sustainable, let alone sufficiently kept in check by state and federal courts and legislatures.
[In best Spanish accent]: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
You can debate whether violent protest is right or wrong, but it's generally not terrorism by any reasonable definition, most directly because the aim is not asymmetrical conflict to incite terror but direct conflict with authorities to register displeasure. Calling it "terrorism" is not only foolish but is offensive in that it trivializes actual terrorism by grouping it together with these much more innocuous things.
Finally, you seem to dismiss violent protest out of hand as invalid, but that's essentially absurd on its face, since this is just an intermediate level of force, between non-violent protest and outright rebellion, used by the populous to maintain control. I certainly think that violent protests are used in many situations where they are uncalled for, counter-productive, and wrong, but there can also be times they are necessary to show the will of the people (and hopefully avoid all out civil war). Remember the words of Thomas Jefferson:
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
But my point is, the NCIC isn't some secretive blacklist like the infamous no-fly list. The NCIC is detailed, you can view your record and correct it, if it's incorrect.
Here's what I find when I look further, unvarnished outrage:
The NCIC may not be as bad as no-fly lists but that makes it's abuse more shocking. The three arrests were for protesting and it is clear than the activists are not the violent felons the laws were designed to keep out of Canada. This is an evil political abuse that will keep these protesters legally out of Canada for five years.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
If you ever compare video footage of the toppling of Saddam's statue in Bagdad with the video footage of the fall of the Berlin Wall, you might understand what I mean: The people watching the Saddam Statue falling could have also been watching the demolition of an old building on a construction site. It was just something to watch, but nothing to cheer about. The overall feeling was bleak, with some apathy and a little bit mocking about the 12 youths who were trying to actually get the statue down, which didn't work until an U.S. tank was gong to help by pulling the statue down.
I personally believed there were both noble and ignoble goals behind going to war in Iraq-
Then you're deeply ignorant and painfully naive. Wars do not happen for noble goals. Deal with that fact, and you'll be well on your way to waking up and sounding like you actually live in the real world.
I wasn't dumb enough to believe Saddam was supporting Al-Queda, or that our administration had nothing but good motives behind the invasion,
OK, but...
but I knew Saddam was a horrible monster that had been a serious threat to his neighbors and stability in the region.
So you know that the administration was lying in order to push an agenda that you knew wasn't good (or related) and yet because your enemy is pure evil, they must be pure good since they're opposing him?
Seriously, that's what you just said or close enough.
Since Saddam is an "evil monster", it's ok with you to let some other evil monsters destroy America and rob it blind in order to push their own agenda which you already knew was bullshit?!?!
Dude, you are batshit fucking insane, and you are responsible for what Bush has done to this country due to your idiocy. Grow up, be a mna nad deal with that fact as opposed to whining like a little bitch about how you shouldn't be called stupid for doing stupid things.
I don't think it was unreasonable to assume that our administration was just incompetent instead of malicious.
That just proves how deeply fucking ignorant and naive you are. It is 100% unreasonable to assume something so fucking stupid when you could have just read the writings of the members of this administration, followed the money and paid attention to the hard sell and the lies at the time it was happening. That's what all the good intelligent people did, and that's why none of them supported Bush for a second. I'm sorry if you don't like it, but when you repeatedly do things that stupid, it's perfectly reasonable to call you stupid because you've proven it repeatedly.
Now most people assume our leaders are both incompetent and malicious, but early on everything could have been explained by mere stupidity.
No, it could not, under any circumstances, be explained merely by stupidity. Again, you demonstrate only your deep naivity and you total lack of understanding of either history or human nature.