Protestor/activist jailed and labeled a terrorist by federal government.
Charlotte, North Carolina (CNN) -- James Ian Tyson acknowledges that he is a political activist. He admits he has been arrested a couple of times for relatively minor offenses. But he insists he's not a terrorist.
Tyson, who describes himself on his Facebook page as a carpenter with a "veggie farm," says he has no idea how he wound up on the government's terrorist watch list. He just wants to save the rain forest. The only dings on his record, at least as far as he knows, consist of fishing for trout out of season and driving while impaired.
The 27-year-old, known as "Jimmy" around Charlotte's activist community, was pulled over Sunday near a building where protesters plan their demonstrations. He was charged with driving with a revoked license. And then he was thrown in jail under exceptionally high bail -- $10,000.
The arresting officer asked a magistrate to keep him behind bars for the duration of the Democratic National Convention, which ends Thursday night. He advised against releasing Tyson on his promise to show up for court.
"Why do you feel suspect is a risk?" a bail sheet asked, and the officer wrote: "Known activist and a protester who is currently on a terrorist watch list. Request he be held due to DNC being a National Special Security Event." (Both political conventions received the designation from the federal Department of Homeland Security. It freed up federal funding for security and put the Secret Service in charge.)
"The question is whether or not the stop and the arrest and the attempt to get an unreasonably high bond amount was really a pretext for a police officer's selective motivation to censor an individual's political activity," said Jason Huber, a professor at Charlotte School of Law. "If that's the case, then you're in First Amendment territory."
He added it will be difficult to prove what was on the officer's mind when he made what appears to be a legitimate car stop.
"It's a question of what evidence is there to determine intent," Huber said. "There rarely is a smoking gun when it comes to establishing someone's unlawful intent in a particular action. And you have to rely on circumstantial evidence. The circumstantial in this case is a bit suspicious."
Tyson spent Sunday night and most of Monday in jail. He called a legal hot line for protesters and was given an attorney, Derek Fletcher. The Charlotte lawyer got before a judge, Lisa Bell, on Monday and convinced her to lower Tyson's bail to $2,500. He walked free on Monday night.
"I have done nothing wrong and have nothing to hide," Tyson said as he left the Mecklenburg County Jail. "I believe this is an attempt to stifle my First Amendment rights and keep my voice from being heard."
"I firmly believe that Mr. Tyson has been profiled and has been singled out as an organizer, and I believe that the government in this case had the intention of suppressing speech before it was even exercised," Fletcher said. "I think it's censorship pure and simple, and I have never seen a $10,000 cash bond on any kind of traffic charge."
Tyson agrees. "I personally believe that this was purely politically motivated," he said, "solely, solely based on the pretext of getting me off the street, pushing me into a cell and throwing away the key for as long as they possibly could."
http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/06/politics/protester-arrest-controversy/index.html
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/09/04/3504248/name-on-watch-list-stuns-local.html
Domestic consequences of being on terrorist watch list:
By Michael Froomkin:
I was very struck by this story from the periphery of the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, Protester jailed, denies he’s a terrorist, in which a local police officer argued that an arrested protestor should be held without bail during the convention because he was on an (unspecified) national terrorist watch list — probably this one.
As far as I am aware, this is the first documented example of a non-air-travel-related domestic consequence of being on a ‘terrorist watch list’:
Tyson, who describes himself on his Facebook page as a carpenter with a “veggie farm,” says he has no idea how he wound up on the government’s terrorist watch list. He just wants to save the rain forest. The only dings on his record, at least as far as he knows, consist of fishing for trout out of season and driving while impaired.
The 27-year-old, known as “Jimmy” around Charlotte’s activist community, was pulled over Sunday near a building where protesters plan their demonstrations. He was charged with driving with a revoked license. And then he was thrown in jail under exceptionally high bail — $10,000.
The arresting officer asked a magistrate to keep him behind bars for the duration of the Democratic National Convention, which ends Thursday night. He advised against releasing Tyson on his promise to show up for court.
“Why do you feel suspect is a risk?” a bail sheet asked, and the officer wrote: “Known activist + protester who is currently on a terrorist watch list. Request he be held due to DNC being a National Special Security Event.”
I should note that from one prespective the system did work, after some delay.
Tyson spent Sunday night and most of Monday in jail. He called a legal hot line for protesters and was given an attorney, Derek Fletcher. The Charlotte lawyer got before a judge, Lisa Bell, on Monday and convinced her to lower Tyson’s bail to $2,500. He walked free on Monday night.
On the other hand, speech was chilled:
“I have done nothing wrong and have nothing to hide,” Tyson said as he left the Mecklenburg County Jail. “I believe this is an attempt to stifle my First Amendment rights and keep my voice from being heard.”
He said he was no longer interested in protesting during the convention, believing police had targeted him. “At this point,” he said, “I would like to go home and visit my parents and play with my dog.”
If the CNN article by Ted Metzger and Ann O’Neill is accurate, I think this small incident is actually a big deal.
http://www.discourse.net/2012/09/domestic-consequences-of-being-on-terrorist-watch-list/
FOIA documents show FBI was watching occupy protestors, some docs still secret on national security grounds.
Just shy of the one-year anniversary of the inaugural Occupy Wall Street protests, the ACLU of Northern California obtained initial documents from the FBI about surveillance of Occupy demonstrations in the region (see the FBI’s response here).
The documents came after an ACLU-NC lawsuit filed after the FBI refused to release any documents in a Freedom of Information Act request. The documents are significant for two reasons:
First, they finally confirm what until now have only been suspicions that the FBI was conducting surveillance of the Occupy movement.
Second, the FBI is refusing to hand over documents "in the interest of national defense or foreign policy." In other words, to the FBI, political protests about economic policy pose an unspecified threat to national security.The FBI has a troubling history of spying on political activists. We're concerned that in 2012, history is still repeating.
Documents from a FOIA request by the Partnership for Civil Justice have shed light on the involvement of various federal agencies, primarily the Department of Homeland Security and National Park Service. Suspicion has long run high that the FBI has been surveilling Occupy protests, but until now, we've seen no official confirmation of the agency's involvement.
The 13 pages of documents released to the ACLU-NC show that the FBI was monitoring Occupy events, in particular, the Port of Oakland shutdown on November 2, 2011 and the multi-city West Coast port shutdown on December 12, 2011. These include an FBI alert to "corporate security officers" in advance of the December 12, 2011 port shutdown.
But more troubling than what the FBI has revealed is what it's refused to reveal. We asked for FBI records about Occupy protests in Northern California, where several of the most high profile demonstrations have taken place, as well as intelligence bulletins, training materials, or justifications for investigating the Occupy movement anywhere in the country. The agency claims it only has a grand total of 37 pages on all of these topics, and is refusing to hand over more than half of those documents. One of the justifications for withholding the information, is that it supposed must be kept secret "in the interest of national defense or foreign policy."
We're at a loss to understand how information about the Occupy movement could implicate national security, and if it does, how the FBI can claim that it has only 37 pages of documents. We intend to push for additional information from the FBI on these issues. Stay tuned.
http://www.aclu.org/blog/free-speech-national-security/foia-documents-show-fbi-was-watching-occupy-protestors-some-docs