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Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses

By TChris, Section War on Terror
Posted on Fri Jul 15, 2005 at 08:29:42 AM EST
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by TChris

The arrest of Brandon Mayfield (TalkLeft background collected here) may be the clearest example of the administration's misuse of the material witness law. Lacking sufficient evidence to arrest Mayfield for a crime (the FBI had only a fingerprint and chose to believe it belonged to Mayfield, a conclusion that Spanish authorities and the FBI's fingerprint-matching program disputed), the government instead arrested him pursuant to a material witness warrant.

Mayfield is striking back. His legal team will appear today for pretrial proceedings in his civil suit.

Mayfield's legal team -- led by celebrity lawyer Gerry Spence, who successfully defended former Philippines first lady Imelda Marcos on racketeering charges in 1990 -- contends there is evidence to show the FBI was not on firm footing when they made their arrest.

Mayfield's lawsuit raises critical issues.

A convert to Islam, Mayfield argues he was singled out because of his faith. He also charges that key sections of the Patriot Act, which he says were used to install wiretaps and conduct secret searches of his home, are unconstitutional.

"Because the Patriot Act is up for renewal, Mr. Mayfield's case is important because it shows how the government can secretly avoid the civil rights and civil liberties of Americans -- and leave no one secure from secret government spying and investigations," said Elden Rosenthal, one of Mayfield's lawyers.

< Another One Bites the Dust | Justice Sunday II: Return of the Extremists >

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    Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses | 5 comments (5 topical)
    Re: Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:01:15 PM EST
    I don't yet have anything cobbled together from my voluminous and typo-ridden notes from the courtroom today, but here's a tiny bit of, well, flavor. For lack of a beter term for it.

    Re: Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses (none / 0) (#3)
    by Ernesto Del Mundo on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:01:15 PM EST
    "The most important thing I could do with my life right now," Spence said to the court, "is to find out if the Constitution of the United States is going to go flopping down like a piece of garbage from this courtroom."
    Yes and to be more specific..."like used toilet paper from Bush's Justice Department."

    Re: Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses (none / 0) (#4)
    by wg on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:01:15 PM EST
    I'll will second b!X's observation that following these proceedings was nearly impossible w/o reading the original motion. Surely no member of the jury had a slightest idea what this was all about. Only three stayed till the very end. A few choice morsels follow. --- Parenthetically, it is sad that one has to pay to obtain access to public court documents in federal cases. The current system (PACER) charges 8c per page which can add up pretty quickly in cases like this. Also for some strange reason few courts publish their calendars on their web sites which means that you have to call them to see if anything of interest is scheduled or have to go to court personally to see what's posted. Kind of incompatible with having an open court system in the 21 century imho.

    Re: Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses (none / 0) (#5)
    by wg on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:01:15 PM EST
    .... Spence said that he FBI did one of their sneak and peek searches (feds refuse to say how many times they entered his house) not knowing that one of his kids was in the house hiding in the closet. Must been a scary experience for a few years old kid to hide in a closet while the FBI surveillance people were rummaging through the house. For my own experience see here. -- DoJ attorneys revealed (gleefully!) that Mayfield is suing the FBI under the Administrative Tort Law for a cool 70 MILLION. This is in addition to the present action. The feds seem to be taking it seriously, they offered to go to a nonbinding mediation, which Spence refused to do so far. Nice to know tort is doable in the FBI cases. -- The DoJ team was large, 4 or five, most were mute throughout. One of their lead lawyers, a young kid, was extremely impressive, technically speaking. Compared to him Spence was an epitome of high minded but essentially empty verbiage. Impressive theatrically but I don't think theater will get his client (and the nation) far in present circumstances. At moments he displayed astonishing ignorance or misunderstanding of basic points of law (Patriot Act for example). -- On all points of law raised in their motion (retention of records, qualified immunity for FBI personnel and consultants, ability of a judge to pronounce on constitutionality of anything in FISA, Patriot Act or such) my sense was that DoJ lawyers prevailed. Sadly the laws passes over the last decade or so (FISA, Oklahoma, Patriot Act, etc, etc) gradually eroded the rights of citizenry and powers or courts to the point that law enforcement people, the FBI especially, are effectively outside the reach of law. The only thing Spence could do was to resort to making a dramatic appeal to the judge - do something, the current corruption of the basic constitutional rights (via Patriot Act, FISA etc) is unbearable. The judge seemed sympathetic to his plea which was unusual given the prevailing ideological bent of Oregon judiciary and asked him several times - give me something to work with but Spence was unable to offer anything. Just repeated his - do something judge, please.

    Re: Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses (none / 0) (#1)
    by Kitt on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:01:16 PM EST
    Good for him.

    Mayfield's Lawsuit Progresses | 5 comments (5 topical)