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Monday, March 25,
2002 Maryland's House of Delegates is preparing to pass anti-terrorism legislation today that would dramatically expand the ability of police to tap phones and eavesdrop on the e-mail and Internet activity of suspected criminals -- part of a deluge of terror-busting measures under consideration in nearly every state capital. The Maryland bill, like those in dozens of other states, has inspired a heated clash between civil libertarians and those who believe that some rights must be compromised to prevent another attack on U.S. soil. Each time that conflict surfaced last week, as Maryland delegates met in committee to craft the legislation, concerns about security ultimately outweighed fears about the potential for police abuse. "I realize that this bill basically says you can tap someone's phone for jaywalking, and normally I would say, 'No way,' " said Del. Dana Lee Dembrow (D-Montgomery). "But after what happened on September 11th, I say sc**w 'em." The results have been similar across the country, including in Virginia, as state lawmakers inch their way into the war against international terrorism. Although some of the 1,200 anti-terrorism measures being contemplated by state legislatures this year have involved such benign security methods as requiring fencing around reservoirs, others will substantially broaden the scope of police rights to probe into private lives. "State legislatures are in the process of recalibrating the appropriate balance between liberty and security in the post-September 11th world," said Michael Mello, a Vermont Law School professor who recently testified on an anti-terrorism bill in Montpelier. Most of what is occurring, Mello said, involves a localized repackaging of federal anti-terrorism laws, passed by Congress in October as the USA-Patriot Act. A range of new eavesdropping allowances, in particular, draw from the federal statute, which applies only to federal law enforcement agencies. Like the Patriot Act, proposals in Maryland and a new law in Virginia permit law enforcement officials to get court orders to retrieve records of e-mails and other electronic communications, not just telephone records. Maryland's proposal would also expand the ability of police to tap phones by allowing investigators to plant a listening device indefinitely, not just 30 days. It would, for the first time, permit use of a "roving wire tap" to record a suspect's conversations on multiple phones with a single warrant. And it would allow a judge to seal search warrants for up to a year. The bill which would move to the Senate if approved, would also tighten airport security and widen the purview of state transit police to cover more area around harbors and airports. It would, for the first time, define terrorism as a specific crime and attach to it severe penalties. "Our goal was to conform our law to what the feds are already doing," said Del. Ann Marie Doory (D-Baltimore), who sponsored the Maryland Security Protection Act of 2002. "This has been our goal from the start." In January, Gov. Parris N. Glendening (D) formed a task force to pull a wide range of initiatives into one bill. Several of the task force proposals have since been stripped away by uneasy lawmakers, including restrictions that would have prevented foreign nationals from holding driver's licenses if their visas had expired. Backers of the remaining proposals said they hoped that local and state police agencies would use the new, expanded powers to assist federal agencies in monitoring suspected terrorists who move into suburban neighborhoods and try to blend in to the local scene -- just as a band of Sept. 11 hijackers did in Laurel before their attack. Given the potential for mass casualties, said Del. Robert A. Zirkin (D-Baltimore County), the occasional intrusion into lives "seems worth the risk." "I know it's hard to swallow," Zirkin said. "But I think we need to take a couple steps in that direction right now." But just as the USA-Patriot Act evoked an outcry from a surprising coalition of liberals and conservatives, these state proposals have found a wide band of critics. In the Maryland House, concerns about the intrusiveness of the bill have brought together Del. Sharon Grosfeld (D-Montgomery), arguably among the most liberal members, and Del. Carmen Amedori (R-Carroll), among the most conservative. Said Grosfeld: "These changes infringe on basic and fundamental civil rights." Added Amedori: "Security is important, but are we going to be any more secure if we impede on personal freedom?" During committee hearings, the opponents argued that election year politics -- and the intense political pressure to pass something that appears to be tough on terrorism -- is at the root of Maryland's anti-terrorism effort. They predicted that most of the proposals, if they become law, would be used in criminal cases that have nothing to do with international terrorism. David Rocah, a staff attorney for the Baltimore office of the American Civil Liberties Union, called it "dishonest packaging." "These are measures that police agencies have sought locally and nationally for many years, and they represent an extraordinary expansion of law enforcement power," he said. Rocah said that police will wind up listening in on conversations and reading e-mail involving innocent people. He pointed to statistics compiled by local prosecutors in Maryland showing that 91 percent of the conversations that were recorded by police during investigations in 2000 turned out to involve parties with no connection to the crimes being investigated. "That's where there's a huge invasion of privacy," Rocah said, "and where innocent people are victimized." Critics have also raised objections to the provision that makes terrorism a new crime. Much as hate-crime laws attached stiffer penalties to existing infractions, the terrorism charge could be hooked to any of a long list of existing crimes, as long as the suspect committed them with the intention of instilling widespread fear or coercing action from the government. The problem with that, Grosfeld said, is that "you're talking about very harsh penalties that could be added based on someone's political beliefs, not because of their actions. That strikes me as very dangerous." That does not frighten Del. Thomas E. Hutchins (R-Charles), a Vietnam War veteran who said the current climate in the country demands different rules. "You've got to understand the importance of being able to gather intelligence to block something horrible from happening," Hutchins told his colleagues. "You've got to understand how a war is fought. I can tell you, it's pretty d**n dirty." http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A12099-2002Mar24?language=printer
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