Feds Give Stats On Snooping

[David]

Public libraries have been contacted about 50 times by federal investigators as part of their anti-terrorism efforts, but the Justice Department won't say whether they looked through or took information from their records.

The department also released documents Tuesday showing it had detained fewer than 50 people as material witnesses without charging them in the war in terror as of January.

"Fewer than 10" FBI offices have conducted investigations involving visits to mosques, the Justice Department said. It also said the FBI does not keep files on information collected at public places or events unless it relates directly to a criminal or terrorist probe.

The information was revealed as part of the House Judiciary Committee's efforts to oversee use of the USA Patriot Act, a tool in the Justice Department's war on terror since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The level of surveillance conducted under the Patriot Act could become part of the looming debate in Congress over what's being called "Patriot Act II," or the Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003, which would further expand the government's law enforcement powers.

Assistant Attorney General Viet Dinh told a House Judiciary subcommittee that while exact details were classified, an informal Justice Department survey showed libraries had been "contacted approximately 50 times" in the last year using the Patriot Act.

The law allows the government to secretly view records of materials checked out of public libraries or bought in bookstores and observe Web activity on library computers. It also forbids librarians or booksellers to talk about any investigations.

Nationwide, librarians have begun posting warning signs, changing policies and even shredding documents in reaction to the law.

But "libraries and bookstores should not be allowed to become safe havens for terrorists," Dinh said.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which has jousted repeatedly with the Justice Department over the new powers, said the department's 60-page response to lawmakers' questions did not provide enough details about the library investigations, possible FBI scrutiny of mosque membership lists and other civil liberties issues.

But Committee Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., commended the "timing and thoroughness" of the answers.

The panel's top Democrat, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, said the Justice Department could "have been more forthcoming in terms of the manner in which and how freely the new powers have been used."

The number of material witnesses detained around the country without charges has been a closely guarded secret, with officials repeatedly insisting that the law prevented their names and circumstances from being made public.

In the documents released Tuesday, Justice officials said that as of January, the number of people detained as material witnesses was fewer than 50, with 90 percent of those detained for 90 days or less and half held for 30 days or less.

The documents do not say how many are still being held as material witnesses, an arrangement prosecutors use with a judge's approval for people believed to have important testimony that might not be obtained otherwise.

Sometimes the people are eventually charged, as in the conspiracy and terrorism support case brought in April against software engineer Maher Hawash in Portland, Ore.

The USA Patriot Act, passed by Congress shortly after the 2001 attacks, greatly expanded the government's surveillance and detention powers.

The law was buttressed last year when the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review backed the Justice Department's position that prosecutors and the FBI could share intelligence and criminal information involving spies or terrorists.

The Justice documents say that the ruling led to a review of 4,500 intelligence files to determine if they could help bring criminal charges, with the information "incorporated in numerous cases" that were not further identified.

Under previous guidelines, the government's criminal and intelligence sides were barred from directly communicating.

Some civil liberties advocates say the firewall was needed because intelligence warrants and wiretaps can be secured with a lower standard of evidence and often cannot be challenged.

In calendar years 2000, 2001, 2002 not a single Justice Department request to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for a warrant was denied.