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Advocacy Blog
Friday, September 08, 2006
Islamic Charity Allowed to Proceed With Lawsuit
Yesterday a federal judge in Oregon ruled that national security would not be threatened with the advancement of a lawsuit that challenges the well known Terrorist Surveillance Program. Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, a charity based in Oregon that distributed religious literature to prison inmates, filed a lawsuit in February claiming that the National Security Administration listened to telephone conversations in 2004 between the group's director in Saudi Arabia and his U.S. lawyers. Judge Garr M. King remarkably did not dismiss the case under the "state secrets privilege," accurately ruling that the NSA program is no longer a secret. From The Oregonian: "The existence of the surveillance program is not a secret, the subjects of the program are not a secret and the general method of the program -- including that it is warrantless -- is not a secret," King wrote. "Where plaintiffs know whether their communications have been intercepted, no harm to national security would occur if plaintiffs are able to prove the general point that they were subject to surveillance."
Al-Haramin submitted a phone log of these monitored calls that U.S. officials mistakenly sent them. Government lawyers argued that the plaintiffs should not be able to see the highly classified document, which is being held in a secure facility in Portland. But he[Judge King] said he would allow them to argue their case based on what they remember seeing in the document.
The New York Times also covered the story today.
Posted by Amanda Adams
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