Federal Judge Rules US No-fly List Violates Constitution

New submitter dmitrygr sends this news from Reuters: The U.S. government's no-fly list banning people accused of links to terrorism from commercial flights violates their constitutional rights because it gives them no meaningful way to contest that decision, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday. ... "The court concludes international travel is not a mere convenience or luxury in this modern world. Indeed, for many international travel is a necessary aspect of liberties sacred to members of a free society," [U.S. District Judge Anna Brown] wrote in her 65-page ruling (PDF). "Accordingly, on this record the court concludes plaintiff's inclusion on the no-fly list constitutes a significant deprivation of their liberty interests in international travel," Brown said.

Comments

Re:Awesome!

[phayes]

The judge's ruling will be challenged & until/unless it wins every appeal (all the way to the supreme court in all probability), the ruling changes nothing.

Sooo, until the ruling is definitively confirmed, nothing changes.

Re:That took long enough

[sir-gold]

It took this long before a judge was actually allowed to make a ruling on it.

In order for a judge to make a ruling, there has to be a court case first, the judges aren't allowed to initiate action on their own. In order for someone to bring a case against the list, they first have to prove that the list affects them (this is why the ACLU couldn't do anything on their own, because they themselves weren't on the list). The problem is that the list is completely secret, so there is no way of knowing someone is on the list until they actually try to fly somewhere and get stopped.

It's taken this long for someone to be officially stopped who had both the resources and the desire to challenge the list in court.

Re:Here's the Solution

[AHuxley]

It gets more fun too
"Immigration officer fired after putting wife on list of terrorists to stop her flying home (31 January 2011)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...
"US Has A 'Secret Exception' To Reasonable Suspicion For Putting People On The No Fly List" (Apr 17, 2014)
https://www.techdirt.com/artic...
That other list:
"DHS ‘hands off’ list allowed suspects with terror ties into U.S."
http://www.washingtontimes.com...
'Hands off' list? Senator questions whether DHS allowing those with terror ties into US (May 07, 2014)
http://www.foxnews.com/politic...