Judge tosses lawsuit over FBI surveillance of California mosques [View all]

[cbayer]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/15/us-usa-mosque-lawsuit-idUSBRE87E03Y20120815

By Dan Whitcomb
LOS ANGELES | Tue Aug 14, 2012 11:35pm EDT
(Reuters) - A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed a lawsuit charging that the FBI violated civil liberties by sending an informant into several California mosques to spy on U.S. Muslims, ruling that allowing the case to proceed could risk disclosure of government secrets.

U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney wrote in a 36-page order that he was reluctant to toss out the case before it could be litigated but was forced to weigh national security against individual liberties and an open judicial process.

In the decision, Carney compared himself to the fictional Greek hero Odysseus, who while sailing home from the Trojan War faced navigating his ship between a six-headed monster on one side and a dangerous whirlpool on the other.

"Odysseus opted to pass by the monster and risk a few of his individual sailors, rather than hazard the loss of his entire ship to the sucking whirlpool," he wrote. "Similarly, the proper application of the state secrets privilege may unfortunately mean the sacrifice of individual liberties for the sake of national security."

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