Govt obtains wide AP phone records in probe

[Newsjock]

Source: Associated Press

The Justice Department secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press in what the news cooperative's top executive called a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into how news organizations gather the news.

The records obtained by the Justice Department listed incoming and outgoing calls, and the duration of each call, for the work and personal phone numbers of individual reporters, general AP office numbers in New York, Washington and Hartford, Conn., and the main number for AP reporters in the House of Representatives press gallery, according to attorneys for the AP.

... In a letter of protest sent to Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday, AP President and Chief Executive Officer Gary Pruitt said the government sought and obtained information far beyond anything that could be justified by any specific investigation. He demanded the return of the phone records and destruction of all copies.

... The government would not say why it sought the records. U.S. officials have previously said in public testimony that the U.S. attorney in Washington is conducting a criminal investigation into who may have leaked information contained in a May 7, 2012, AP story about a foiled terror plot. The story disclosed details of a CIA operation in Yemen that stopped an al-Qaida plot in the spring of 2012 to detonate a bomb on an airplane bound for the United States.

Read more: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/govt-obtains-wide-ap-phone-records-probe

[MotherPetrie]

1. Horrifying abuse of power

[SugarShack]

2. Just like th AT&T spyshop Obama said he would procecute, then didn't.

[MotherPetrie]

3. He's been too busy prosecuting whistleblowers and medical marijuana growers and

fighting to restrict the morning after pill.

[jberryhill]

6. Does AP, a corporation, have a fourth amendment right in relation to its phone line?

Does AP, a corporation, have a right to privacy?

We aren't going to get all weak in the knees over supposed constitutional rights of corporations now are we?

[JDPriestly]

11. 4th Amendment rights havef been limited by the courts. I think the courts have been lax.

Here is one view:

Individuals receive no Fourth Amendment protection unless they can demonstrate that they have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the place that was searched or the property that was seized. The U.S. Supreme Court explained that what "a person knowingly exposes to the public, even in his own home or office, is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection…. But what he seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected." Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 88 S. Ct. 507, 19 L. Ed. 2d 576 (1976). In general the Court has said that individuals enjoy a reasonable expectation of privacy in their own bodies, Personal Property, homes, and business offices. Individuals also enjoy a qualified expectation of privacy in their automobiles.

Individuals ordinarily possess no reasonable expectation of privacy in things like bank records, vehicle location and vehicle paint, garbage left at roadside for collection, handwriting, the smell of luggage, land visible from a public place, and other places and things visible in plain or open view. Houseguests typically do not possess a reasonable expectation of privacy in the homes they are visiting, especially when they do not stay overnight and their sole purpose for being inside the house is to participate in criminal activity such as a drug transaction. Minnesota v. Carter, 525 U.S. 83, 119 S. Ct. 469, 142 L. Ed. 2d 373 (1998). Similarly, a defendant showing only that he was a passenger in a searched car has not shown an expectation of privacy in the car or its contents. Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 99 S. Ct. 421, 58 L. Ed. 2d 387 (1978). Both the houseguest and the motor vehicle passenger must assert a property or possessory interest in the home or motor vehicle before a court will recognize any Fourth Amendment privacy interests such that would prevent a police officer from searching those places without first obtaining a warrant.

. . . .

Administrative agencies may conduct warrantless searches of highly regulated industries, such as strip mining and food service. Federal and state statutes authorize warrantless, random drug testing of persons in sensitive positions, such as air traffic controllers, drug interdiction officers, railroad employees, and customs officials. In each of these types of searches, the Supreme Court has ruled that the need for public safety outweighs the countervailing privacy interests that would normally require a search warrant. However, a few lower federal courts have ruled that warrantless searches of public housing projects are unconstitutional, not withstanding the fact that residents of the public housings projects signed petitions supporting warrantless searches to rid their communities of drugs and weapons.
. . . .

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Search+and+Seizure

This will be interesting! Two amendments are involved, the First and the Fourth.

I am not aware of a specific provision giving the government the authority to make an exception from the Bill of Rights for national security concerns. That, I think, may be purely a creation of the Supreme Court -- increasingly more conservative Supreme Courts.

[jberryhill]

12. That's all well put, however

My comment was directed to the "corporations don't have Constitutional rights" contingent.

Are we now going to say that AP, a corporation, has privacy rights?

[JDPriestly]

14. The concept of "corporate personhood" is just a legal construction.

It is a tool used to permit lawyers to talk about corporations.

There is no such thing as a corporate person.

A person is flesh and blood. People are animals and eat plants and animals.

Corporations are legal constructs.

A person is born of a human mother and father.

A corporation is authorized to do business by a state government.

Do you think a corporation should be allowed to vote in local, state and federal elections?

If not, why not?

The AP is not really dealing with corporate rights. It is dealing with the personal rights of its reporters.

[jberryhill]

15. In relation to the work phones?

The reporters don't own those phones.

As far as DU is concerned, the government can take anything belonging to a corporation, since corporations should not have Fifth Amendment rights either.

[JDPriestly]

17. Probably. And they may have had probable cause to get everything.

The question is whether the reporters had a reasonable expectation of privacy, not whether they owned the phones. If they own the phones, it strengthens the argument that they have a reasonable expectation of privacy.

If the First Amendment gives their work certain protections, they might argue that those protections should be considered in determining whether they have a reasonable expectation of privacy as to their communications.

Usually if I recall correctly the government can subpoena phone records. Did they? They could have obtained them without sneakiness I think.

[Yo_Mama]

21. The reporters have personal rights

The legal theory of corporate rights derives from the fact that corporations are compose of people, so certain violations of corporations necessarily involve violations of the constitutional rights of the persons composing the corporations.

There is also a legal tradition in the US deriving from the freedom of the press specifically named in the First Amendment that in some cases grants another level of immunity from government interference to reporters/journalists, etc. That US tradition actually predates the Constitution, which is I guess why freedom of the press was written into the First Amendment. Zenger was in 1735.

Zurcher is probably the most applicable SC precedent:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0436_0547_ZS.html

3. Properly administered, the preconditions for a search warrant (probable cause, specificity with respect to the place to be searched and the things to be seized, and overall reasonableness), which must be applied with particular exactitude when First Amendment interests would be endangered by the search, are adequate safeguards against the interference with the press' ability to gather, analyze, and disseminate news that respondents claim would ensue from use of warrants for third-party searches of newspaper offices. Pp. 563-567.

A wiretap order has similarities to a search warrant. This was very broad indeed, and it will be interesting to see if a court case ensues.

[jeff47]

27. It's being spun that way, yes.

'Course it isn't the AP being investigated, and they did follow the law in getting the records.

But that wouldn't sell as many papers as a nice big cup of outrage.

[DeSwiss]

4. K&R

[center]

“Winston Smith: Does Big Brother exist?

O'Brien: Of course he exists.

Winston Smith: Does he exist like you or me?

O'Brien: You do not exist. ”

~George Orwell, 1984

[/center]

[Seeking Serenity]

5. Ugh

Just ugh.

[OnyxCollie]

7. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

[Malik Agar]

8. Welcome to 1984

He gazed up at the enormous face. Forty years it had taken him to learn what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark moustache. O cruel, needless misunderstanding! O stubborn, self-willed exile from the loving breast! Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.

[Iliyah]

9. The AP article put a spy

in jeopardy for his life who was in al-Qaida at that time and who gave the information about the potential bomb attack , and US asked AP not to divulge certain information but they did it anyways.

I don't know what happened to the spy. So therefore, please stop jumping to conclusions and get some facts first. Non-facts are for the GOP who undoubtely will run with this story and blame Pres O and his Adm.

[davidpdx]

29. It doesn't matter

People are going to bash him on both sides no matter what the reason is. It is funny that when Valarie Plame was outed that everyone was outraged.

[Kelvin Mace]

10. Why is AP surprised

It agreed to look the other way on torture, domestic spying, campaign fraud, election fraud, war crimes etc, by every branch of government. So, I am at a loss as to whey they are upset that it is happening to them.

If the press actually did its job, this would not be happening.

[OnyxCollie]

24. But, but, but,

I didn't think he would hurt me!

[woo me with science]

31. [phone]

[kona808]

13. Just the White House Plumbers

Trying to fix a leak.

Where have I heard that before?

[dipsydoodle]

16. Reuters : Associated Press says U.S. government seized journalists' phone records

(Reuters) - The Associated Press on Monday said the U.S. government secretly seized telephone records of AP offices and reporters for a two-month period in 2012, describing the acts as a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into news-gathering operations.

AP Chief Executive Gary Pruitt, in a letter posted on the agency's website, said the AP was informed last Friday that the Justice Department gathered records for more than 20 phone lines assigned to the agency and its reporters.

"There can be no possible justification for such an overbroad collection of the telephone communications of The Associated Press and its reporters," Pruitt said in the letter, which was addressed to Attorney General Eric Holder.

An AP story on the records seizure said the government would not say why it sought the records.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/05/13/uk-usa-justice-ap-idUKBRE94C0ZY20130513

[humbled_opinion]

18. Isn't this really...

much ado about nothing? Isn't the Justice Dept just doing thier job in this case? need ammo

[Kablooie]

32. No. This seems to be an extreme overreach. Not a good sign for us.

[Pterodactyl]

19. Aw, maaaaaaaaaaaaan.

[Yo_Mama]

20. We are not having a couple of good weeks here. n/t

[SpankMe]

22. My thoughts exactly

Between this and the IRS audit scandal, we can pretty much kiss 2014 goodbye.

Dems everywhere should be required to have mandatory ethics training, and then run the country as cleanly, transparently and non-corruptly as possible. Maybe we can depend on the short memory of the American public and salvage 2016.

[Yo_Mama]

23. I wouldn't say it's that dire

But shit, talk about effing yourself up.

[John2]

30. How so,

the only parties crying foul are conservatives and the media. I think they need to be investigated, how partisan they are. Some of these reporters seems to be partisan the way they investigate things. The media didn't raise such a big deal when the IRS scrutinized the NAACP did they? And the NAACP was what they say they represent. All these Tea Party people complaining about being non partial and not attached to the Republican party is a joke. Anybody can see they are politically motivated and support conservative candidates.
The only way the IRS could investigate to see if they were breaking laws was to check them out. Maybe they shouldn't use the labels Tea Party and Patriot. Saying they just support certain legislation and tying it to Social Programs is a bunch of crap.

Where was the A.P. at during the lead up to Iraq? I heard Eric Holder reclused himself but this was a decision made by other justice Department officials operating independently of the White House. This is basically a fight between the AP and the Justice Department regarding something they thought those reporters were doing and could threaten the life another. The AP is claiming it was too sweeping and focused. I guess both sides are exercising their wheaties and has the most muscle. My bet is the Justice Department wins the battle in the name of National Security under the Patriot Act courtesy of the Media's friends in the Bush Administration.

Benghazi is not going anywhere either. It might energize the rightwing base but it wouldn't energize any normal people. I think the Media needs to be rough up because they t5think they can get away with anything without journalistic integrity. You can count me as one not a friend of the media these days. In fact, the Justice Department needs to do more investigations the Republican propaganda machine. How about widening them to voters rights and a certain Illegal War, the Press failed to do their jobs at? We can all have a big investigation Party until election day since that is all the Republicans seems to be interested in doing.

[DeSwiss]

25. Couple of weeks??

- Oh yeah, right. A couple of 'not good' weeks. Yep, that'd explain it....

[Yo_Mama]

26. Well, that made me laugh

And I was just sitting here in sort of a dazed stupor that was veering toward depression, so thank you.

But really, this is not funny.

[DeSwiss]

28. Change, is seldom seen as funny.....

...at the time it's first happening. Fear is the usual response because of the ''unknown factors.'' Then we adjust. Hopefully it'll not be a repeat of the past, which we're prone to do. That is always a possibility. We underrate ourselves and our abilities in this respect, constantly.


- But I always like to remember the words of my father who taught me as a little boy: ''Don't let things in life worry you because nobody gets out alive anyway.''

[center][/center]