Issue No. 61 – March 6, 2012

NCPCF News Digest - Issue No. 61 -  March 6, 2012

‘Civil Freedoms for All’   

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.   Martin Luther King, Jr.

In this issue

Pakistani-born U.S. teen plans guilty plea in terror case

Uzbek refugee accused of terrorism protests solitary confinement

Attorney General Holder defends execution without charges

NYC’s Anti-Profiling Law: ‘Not Worth Paper It’s Written On’ 

Angry Birds, Meet Jailbirds: New App Helps You Snitch on Your Friends 

An Executive Power to Kill? 

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Website of the Week

Muslim American Civil Liberties Coalition for Truth and Justice

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Faces of Repression

Dritan Duka – Roofer, resident of Cherry Hill, NJ, father of five

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Multimedia

A. Sahar Aziz in AlJazeera.net (2/24): Is spying on Muslims legal in the US? (Video: 25 min.)

B. Glenn Greenwald on AlJazeera.net (2/27): NYPD under fire for spying on Muslim students (Video: 30 min.)

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News Digest

Pre-Crime Reports/Pre-emptive Prosecutions/Material Support 

A. Washington Post (2/22): High-value Guantanamo Bay detainee Majid Khan, in first, reaches plea deal

B. New York Times (2/26): Indictment Said to Be Near for Man Charged in Terror Case

C. Miami Herald (2/27): Guantánamo plea deal unveils new trial strategy

The plea bargain arranged with a former U.S. resident now detained on terror-related charges emulates tactics federal prosecutors have used with high-profile criminal cases.

Community Action/Building Our Coalition 

A. The New American (2/24): Leaders From Across Political Spectrum Unite to Oppose NDAA

B. Indian Country (2/24): Movement Grows to Revoke National Defense Authorization Act

C. Courthouse News Service (2/27): Critics of Indefinite Detention Gain Traction

D. Politico (2/27): ACLU, CAIR call for probe into W.H. funding for Muslim Surveillance

“We are deeply concerned that federal resources may have been used and spying information stored in violation of federal regulations that protect Americans’ private and constitutional rights against law enforcement overreach.

E. The New American (2/28): Utah Joins the Fight Against NDAA

Government Policy Under Scrutiny

A. CNET (2/23): Civil liberties groups: Proposed cybersecurity bill is too broad

Lack of clear definitions regarding who can monitor threats, what countermeasures are allowed, and what constitutes a “crime” has civil liberties groups worried.

B. Truthout (2/24): Guantanamo Detainees Who Cooperate With Government Could Be Removed From Indefinite Detention List

C. Wall Street Journal (2/29):  Court Wary of Torture Cases

Civil Freedoms Under Threat

A. The Hill (2/23): Google, Microsoft, Yahoo aim to defuse privacy issue with ‘Do Not Track’ button

B. Los Angeles Times (2/23): ‘Sovereign citizen’ movement now on FBI’s radar

The Homeland Security Department has ranked the movement as a major threat. Its members reject the law, and some kill police.

Editorials/Opinions 

A. Haroon Mughul in Religious Dispatches Magazine (2/21): How the Logic of Law Enforcement Leads to Spying on Muslims

B. Haroon Mughul in Religious Dispatches Magazine (2/24): Muslim Until Proven Innocent

For no apparent cause, mosques, schools, restaurants, and college students across the northeast, well outside city limits, were surveilled, spied on, infiltrated and reported back on. Well, there was one apparent reason: All were Muslim.

C. Haroon Mughul in Foreign Policy (2/24): Stop the Reckless Spying on Muslims

The New York Police Department is out of control, and it’s making Americans less safe.

D. Glenn Greenwald in Salon (2/24): Those weak losers who care about “law”

E. Tung Yin in the Jurist (2/24): Objecting to Secret Evidence Under FISA 

The standard of review of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrant applications too heavily favors the government by creating an evidentiary burden nearly impossible for defendants to overcome.

F. Ariel Schneller in the Record (2/27): Indefinite Detention Under the NDAA: the Great Attack on Civil Liberties You May Not Have Heard About

We should not tolerate a system in which there is a very strong chance that people will be incarcerated for the rest of their lives without committing any crime or posing any threat to the United States.  While that may seem like an outlandish fear, our experience in Guantanamo illustrates just how fallible the Executive Branch can be in determining who needs to be confined without  trial.

G. Wilfredo Amr Ruiz in the Huffington Post (2/27): Muslim-American Terrorism: Instilling Fear for the Sake of a Budget

H. Glenn Greenwald in Salon (2/28): The NYPD spying controversy: a microcosm for the 9/11 era 

The NYPD spying program exposed by Associated Press may be the most flagrant instance in the War on Terror where “being Muslim” is overtly equated by a government agency to being a Terror threat. 

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