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Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
he is sol, or should be. do you think he should be able to collect from the government?
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Yes, if a jury finds that his rights were violated per Bivens.
Quote:
Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
I know we aren't supposed to say you guys live in lala land when it comes to security, but help me here: a guy was found near ground zero with some pretty suspicious stuff.
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No, he wasn't. He was staying at a hotel near WTC on 9/11. He and the other guests evacuated. The hotel was closed. A few weeks later, the hotel decided to give their guests back their stuff. One of the hotel workers found a two way radio, and said that it was found with this guy's passport and a Koran in the in-room safe. When the hotel told this to the FBI, they arranged to question the guy when he arrived (on the day of his exams) to pick up his stuff. They arrested him as a material witness. Then they did the redacted stuff.
A short time later, a pilot came by the hotel looking for his radio. The hotel told the FBI. It turns out, via serial numbers IIRC, the radio that the FBI seized actually belonged to the pilot. Then the hotel worker was no longer sure that it was found in the Egyptian dude's in-room safe, and, oh, by the way, there were lots of people doing repair work in the hotel before the guest property was collected.
That is not quite the same as "found near ground zero with some pretty suspicious stuff." Given the circumstances, like RT. I have no problem with the FBI questioning the guy, or holding him as a material witness. I do have a bit of a problem with the threats of family torture, and I have a real problem with the government claiming that revealing that the FBI agent made such threats endangers national security.
Quote:
Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
you say we can't torture, I believe you think we shouldn't hand him over to say Egypt, so what do we do? take his word that he did nothing wrong and move on, let him go?
ummmm, he was mistaken identity- he had no good information.
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No. Arrest him -- if it turns out that the hotel was mistaken about where the radio was found, that's not the FBI's fault.
And it wasn't mistaken identity. They knew who he was. It was a false confession -- they got him to admit that the radio was his, and that he used it to listen to in-flight conversations (though I don't think that he confessed to being involved in the 9/11 attacks). That still would have been enough for a jury to convict him of participation in them, I'm sure.
