A federal judge today announced that a hearing scheduled tomorrow in the American Civil Liberties Union's challenge to a provision of the Patriot Act will be open to the public, RAW STORY has learned.
The ACLU is seeking an emergency court order to lift a gag imposed by the FBI so that its client can participate in the public debate about the Patriot Act as Congress prepares to reauthorize or amend it in September. The Patriot Act provisions can gag those challenging it from even speaking publicly about their case.
The lawsuit challenges the National Security Letter (NSL) provision of the Patriot Act, which authorizes the FBI to demand a range of personal records without court approval, such as the identity of a person who has visited a particular Web site on a library computer, or who has engaged in anonymous speech on the Internet. The Patriot Act dramatically expands the NSL power by permitting the FBI to demand records of people who are not suspected of any wrongdoing.
The ACLU filed the lawsuit in Connecticut on behalf of an organization that possesses "a wide array of sensitive information about library patrons, including information about the reading materials borrowed by library patrons and about Internet usage by library patrons." Because of the gag order, the ACLU is currently unable to identify the client in the case.
Source For Full Article :
Click Here
Credit To Author.
Disclaimer
This website contains copyrighted news material - the use of which has
not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We believe
that our use of such material for nonprofit educational purposes (and other
related purposes) constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as
provided for in the US Copyright Law at Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you
wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go
beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. If
for any reason you believe that our use of your material on this site does
not fall within the fair use guidelines, please immediately notify The Black
Vault so that we can promptly address the matter.
Sincerely,
John Greenewald, Jr.
a
The Black Vault Headquarters
http://www.blackvault.com