July 20, 2003
A disturbing but unsurprising report.
When I read the title of Jeralyn's entry at TalkLeft, "New Government Report Documents Patriot Act Abuses," I felt a chill. Ashcroft lies about it but anyone with sense knows that the Justice Department has been walking all over the rights of its victims, ever since the so-called "USA PATRIOT" Act was passed. At last, though, we may actually find out what those abuses are.
Jeralyn refers to a New York Times article, "Accusations of Abuse in Report on USA Patriot Act," and quotes from it extensively. The bit that is interesting to me, though, begins at the paragraph just after her excerpt:
The report is Mr. Fine's evaluation of his efforts to enforce provisions of the Patriot Act that require his office to investigate complaints of abuses of civil rights and civil liberties by Justice Department employees. The provision was inserted into the law by members of Congress who said they feared that the Patriot Act might lead to widespread law enforcement abuses.
The report draws no broad conclusions about the extent of abuses by Justice Department employees, although it suggests that the relatively small staff of the inspector general's office has been overwhelmed by accusations of abuse, many filed by Muslim or Arab inmates in federal detention centers.
The inspector general said that from Dec. 16 through June 15, his office received 1,073 complaints "suggesting a Patriot Act-related" abuse of civil rights or civil liberties.
The report suggested that hundreds of the accusations were easily dismissed as not credible or impossible to prove. But of the remainder, 272 were determined to fall within the inspector general's jurisdiction, with 34 raising "credible Patriot Act violations on their face."
In those 34 cases, it said, the accusations "ranged in seriousness from alleged beatings of immigration detainees to B.O.P. correctional officers allegedly verbally abusing inmates."
Over a thousand complaints. I can understand that many may not have been credible and others may be impossible to prove, but I still wonder in just what way the report "suggested" this. That notwithstanding, however, it is clear that not only has Ashcroft violated citizen's civil rights within the scope of the Act, he has even violated the Act itself, by allowing his department to go much further than the Act itself allows.
I will be waiting impatiently for the report to make it to public view. I have to say as well that Glenn Fine, the inspector general who wrote this report, has my deep respect at the moment. It is good to see that someone there still believes in the Constitution and is not willing to kowtow to Ashcroft's tyranny.
UPDATE, July 21: Here is the actual report; this New York Times article has a summary.