The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the U.S. Department of Justice has threatened to criminally prosecute "California's top firearms official over the state's continued use of a federal databank to hunt down illegal gun users."

"The threat marks a significant escalation in the war between California law enforcement and U.S. officials over gun control and background checks. State officials said that until John Ashcroft became U.S. attorney general in 2001, California's use of the databank was not questioned."

We have to say, we don't want cops using the databank either. Guess we're siding with Ashcroft on this one.

"Lawyers for convicted medical marijuana grower Ed Rosenthal say he is entitled to a new trial because two jurors in the case received outside legal advice that compromised their ability to make an impartial judgment."

The FBI has acknowleged using a Cessna airplane flying over Indiana to monitor residents and businesses it believes might have a terrorist connection.

An airplane that raised questions in this college town is being used by the FBI to monitor people who might have terrorist connections, agency officials acknowledged.

The FBI denied knowledge of the plane earlier this week after aviation officials disclosed that the aircraft was conducting law enforcement surveillance....

Agent Thomas V. Fuentes said the FBI issued the denial because a reporter asked if the airplane is doing electronic surveillance, which it is not. Fuentes and agent James H. Davis said the FBI is not aware of any threat to Bloomington or the state, but is watching many foreign nationals.

Besides individuals, they said, the aircraft is monitoring vehicles and businesses particularly those open late at night from which faxes or e-mails can be sent.

Residents in this city of 69,000 have seen the white, single-engine Cessna 182 at least since Feb. 19 making passes overhead about noon, in the late evening and after midnight.

Just think, we're not even at war yet. We shudder to think what's in store for non-citizens (make that all of us ) once it begins.

Gary Hart has signed onto a statement by a bipartisan group of former Senators opposing war in Iraq.

The group of former senators includes Former United States Senators George McGovern of South Dakota, John Culver of Iowa, Paul Simon of Illinois, Adlai Stevenson III of Illinois, Fred Harris of Oklahoma, Dale Bumpers of Arkansas, Charles Mac Mathias of Maryland, Bill Hathaway of Maine, John Tunney of California, Gary Hart of Colorado, Howard Metzenbaum of Ohio, and James Abourezk of South Dakota.

It's a great statement, go read the whole thing.

Gary Hart was on CNN's Crossfire last night, showing once again he is clearly capable of leading the country. Here's the transcript. His last speech before deciding is Tuesday in Los Angeles. Details here. Send him an email and tell him to run-- info@garyhartnews.com.

The Chicago Tribune blasts the Cook County Sheriff's Office over the beatings of inmates, calling it "out of control" and "a cesspool."

Cook County Sheriff Michael Sheahan's operation is out of control. His undisciplined sheriff's and correctional staff have been caught up in so many incidents of brutality, wrongdoing, falsification of reports and otherwise inappropriate behavior that the only way to count them is by the number of taxpayer dollars that are shelled out in their wake for legal settlements.

Sheahan refuses to learn from past mistakes. He refuses to fix serious, life-threatening problems that are stunningly obvious to everyone but him and his legion of lapdogs....

The Cook County Board has had to shell out millions in civil settlements and attorneys' fees defending county correctional officers and sheriff's police for their on- and off-duty antics.

The sad part is nothing is likely to come of the investigaton and Internal Affairs report, other than some "slaps on the wrist." The Tribune is right, this guy has to go.

Excellent article today about the immigration lawyers fighting to protect the rights of non-citizens in our post-9/11 world.

Since Sept. 11, 2001, the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project has become a central player in the war on terrorism. Relying on appellate skills honed representing immigrant workers and refugees, director Lucas Guttentag and a small team of attorneys are taking a lead role in opposing some of the government's controversial anti-terrorism tactics against non-citizens....

The group's legal challenges to secret detentions, closed deportation hearings and the material witness statute have put it on the front line of a battle that it says stretches well beyond the boundaries of immigration law. And the effort has led the small group to beef up, nearly doubling to seven full-time attorneys and a handful of paralegals in the past year.

"Oftentimes immigrants are the first victims, or first targets, and that's been especially true since Sept. 11," says Guttentag."

Guttentag, like many others, forsees problems down the road for citizens as well. He cites the treatment of Hamdi and Padilla, both of whom are U.S. citizens, yet are being detained by the military without access to lawyers even though no charges have been filed against them.

The principle of detaining U.S. citizens without any judicial process takes us a huge step closer to Japanese-American internment than we were before," says Guttentag. "Before 9-11 I think everybody would have said there's no way that that could happen again today. And now in this climate, it's much easier to understand how a government could take steps that would be the equivalent of Japanese-American internment. And how the public without sufficient vigilance can let it happen by default."

We can't say we haven't been warned.

Lawyers for juvenile suspect John Malvo (now 18) disclosed new evidence today that may help them void Malvo's confession that was obtained during a seven hour interrogation session conducted outside the presence of his lawyers.

Investigators have said there was nothing wrong with the interrogation because Mr. Malvo was no longer represented by the federal public defenders in Baltimore and that the courts in Virginia had not officially appointed anyone to represent him. The public defenders made several objections that day to Mr. Malvo, who has since turned 18, being questioned without his legal guardian or court-appointed counsel.

But one of the defense team members said yesterday that they now had evidence that detectives "knew that they should not have been questioning him."

That lawyer said that evidence, which they plan to use to try to persuade a Fairfax County Circuit Court judge to throw out the statements, includes a Nov. 7 order signed by a federal magistrate in Baltimore, Judge James K. Bredar, that said Mr. Malvo was still represented by his federal lawyers. That order, which the lawyer said was being signed as Mr. Malvo was being interrogated, was unsealed last week by Judge Bredar. A copy of the order was sent that day to prosecutors working on the case.

Even without the new evidence, we've always thought the confession would be problematic. Even if inadmissible against Malvo, it could be admissible in a separate trial against Muhammed, and it might help his death penalty case. Here's more of the facts behind Malvo's interrogation. Still, the real news is today's assertion by Malvo's counsel that the Virginia detectives knew about Magistrate Bredar's Order that Malvo's federal lawyers were still on his case despite the dismissal of federal charges. The Order stated,

Judge Bredar's order said: "While certain charging documents may have been dismissed, you may not have had the opportunity to discuss the significance of those dismissals with your clients" and that "until such time as other competent counsel have assumed responsibility for the representation of your clients" the federal lawyers should continue their representation.

Malvo's lawyers tried to stop the questioning but were rebuffed.

The ACLU reports that a bill that would require the Department of Justice to formally disclose information about its use of the secret intelligence court established under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is garnering bipartisan support in Congress.

The major Republican sponsor of the bill, called the "Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Reporting Act of 2003" is Senator Charles Grassley. Another sponsor is Patrick Leahy (D-VT.)

Specifically, the bill would require public accounting of the number of Americans subjected to surveillance under FISA and the number of times FISA information is used for law enforcement purposes, information that up until now has been kept close to the Department of Justice’s chest despite repeated requests from Congress, the ACLU and other advocacy groups.... A sign-on letter to Senators Leahy, Grassley and Specter on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Reporting Act of 2003 can be found here.

California has settled a long-standing racial profiling lawsuit.

The California Highway Patrol has agreed that its officers will no longer pull over drivers and ask to search their vehicles merely on a hunch they might be carrying drugs or some other contraband, it was announced Thursday.

The agreement is part of the settlement in the federal lawsuit that the ACLU brought against the state over its policy of stopping of minority motorists without just cause--a practice referred to as "DWB" or "driving while black." The settlement is particularly significant because it also contains an agreement by the California Highway Patrol to cease asking for consent to search cars and to stop using minor traffic offenses as a pretext to search for drugs. California is the first state to agree to stop these practices.

The ACLU contended in its lawsuit that giving officers the discretion to seek consent when they did not have probable cause to search resulted in a disproportionate number of motorists of color being subjected to extensive searches, and was a critical component of racial profiling," the ACLU said in a statement. Under the terms of the settlement, the CHP admitted no wrongdoing and agreed only to pay $875,000 in legal fees.

While the CHP maintains the lawsuit failed to establish "a pattern or practice of racial profiling", the ACLU says that through the lawsuit it was able to determine that

intended or not, Latinos were three times as likely to be searched by CHP officers than whites in the agency's Central and Coastal Divisions; African-Americans were approximately twice as likely to be searched in those divisions.

Bill Maher was on Larry King Live last night. Here's what he said about the Democratic presidential contenders:

KING: Any read on the Democratic contenders? So far they're lining up. A lot of play lately for Howard Dean.

MAHER: Howard Dean, yes. I don't know, time will tell.

KING: Anyone jump out at you?

MAHER: You know, I wish Gary Hart would get into it. I'm not sure at this point whether I would say this in a year that I want him to be the candidate, but I think he's interesting. I think he has credentials that other ones don't. No, 1, he was part of the Hart Rudman commission before 9/11, after 9/11.

KING: Told of -- warned of 9/11?

MAHER: And after they put out a report that said no virtual progress. They talked about all of the things that are not being done like guarding the ports, like first responders. All that stuff, it's so boring, it's more fun to go to war. I mean, it's a lot more fun than guarding the ports, whatever, first responders, yada, yada. But Gary Hart has that on his side and he also has the Clinton thing, I think, going for him which is -- he was Clinton before Clinton. Remember?

KING: Yes, he was.

MAHER: And I think he could honestly be the guy to say, you know what, isn't it time that we stop this nonsense because we eliminate people because they are anatomicly correct? Because they have sex and they like women? I suffered for it, Bill Clinton suffered for it. Is the country better off that we cripple these two men?

[transcript via Lexis.com]

If you wish to express your opinion on Attorney General Ashcroft's recent Operation Pipedreams busts, you may send a prewritten letter to the US Attorney General's office by visiting here.

This came in today from NORML. It has more detail than many of the news reports, so we are reprinting it in its entirety.

Justice Department Conducts Nationwide Sweep Of Glass Pipe Manufacturers, Indicts 55 On Federal Drug "Paraphernalia" Charges Those Charged Face Three Years In Prison, $250,000 Fine

Washington, DC: Federal authorities indicted 55 people and raided more than 100 homes and businesses - including the residence of actor Tommy Chong - for allegedly selling glass pipes commonly associated with marijuana smoking, the US Department of Justice announced on Monday.

The indictments and subsequent raids resulted from a pair of ongoing federal investigations dubbed "Operation Pipe Dreams" and "Operation Headhunter" targeting online sellers of glass tobacco pipes, which federal law enforcement officials allege are "primarily intended or designed to be used in ingesting, inhaling or otherwise using controlled substances."

Storefronts in California, Pennsylvania, Iowa and other states that sold pipes and similar merchandise were also raided. Members of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), US Secret Service, US Marshals Service, US Customs Service, and the US Postal Inspection Service all participated in the federal investigation.

Those indicted face a maximum three years in prison and/or a $250,000 fine per count on charges that they sold or conspired to sell various types of drug "paraphernalia." Actor Tommy Chong was not indicted, though raids were conducted on both his business (Chong's Glass) and home.

A new online poll by Angelfire, the leading community site for teens on the web, shows that a majority of teens oppose War in Iraq.

In a recent survey of nearly 3,000 teenagers and young adults (76% U.S. and 24% non-U.S.) a majority (55%) said that they do not support America's pending war with Iraq, while 11% didn't care.

Only 24% of youth polled think that the U.S. should attack immediately while about a third (31%) feel that the U.S. should do nothing and leave Iraq alone. Another quarter (23.7%) feel that the U.S. should wait for U.N. approval and the remaining twenty percent (21%) preferred that the U.S. give weapons inspectors more time.

If the U.S. were to wage war with Iraq, only one in five (21%) think that President Bush should bring back the draft while the majority (70%) disagrees. If the government were to reinstate the draft, not many young people would rush to join in. More than half (53%) would rather avoid the draft by fleeing for Canada or Mexico while about a third (31%) would "do their duty but wouldn't be happy about it."

The poll queried those between the ages of 12 and 21.