In New York, city attorneys have asked a judge to toss out a 1985 consent decree in which the police agreed to stop gathering files on individuals or organizations when there was no evidence of a crime. The cops claim such restrictions prevent them from investigating possible acts of terrorism.

The decree prohibits police from photographing and carrying out surveillance of political demonstrations. To do so the cops would have to establish grounds for suspicion of criminal activity and get the permission of a three-person commission. That body consists of two high ranking cops and a "civilian" appointed by the mayor.

Invoking the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center the attorneys said, "The New York City Police Department had no conception of the challenge it would face in protecting the city and its people from international terrorism," when it signed the consent decree.

David Cohen, former deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency who is now deputy commissioner for intelligence of the New York Police Department, has said in court papers that the decree endangers the safety of New Yorkers, but offers no specifics. As an example of the kind of surveillance that is currently restricted, a city official said the cops would not be able to infiltrate mosques where they allege terrorist acts may be in the planning stages.

City attorneys have offered to present their case to the judge on condition that it be in private and that civil liberties attorneys supporting the decree not be present. The judge demurred, suggesting that attorneys supporting the decree should be allowed to be present, but that he would place them under a gag order. Lawyers who filed the original case resulting in the decree have strongly opposed that arrangement.

In the 1950s the department’s "Red Squad" compiled voluminous files on political meetings and organizations, developing lists of "subversives" which it turned over to Congress and the FBI.

Two decades later members of the Black Panther Party were tried on charges of conspiring to blow up department stores, a police precinct, the New Haven Railroad, and the Botanical Garden in the Bronx. The police had so many agents in the group that jurors could not distinguish between the activities of the Panthers and the undercover agents provocateurs. In one case an undercover cop gave members of the group a map and a rental car, urging them to carry out an armed robbery.

In that case the jury took just three hours to acquit the Panthers. Within weeks defense attorneys filed the class-action law suit which resulted in the decree.  
 
Chicago--consent decree reversed
Early last year a court reversed a consent decree which placed some restrictions on the Chicago police department’s red squad. Lawyers of the city and police hailed the reversal saying it would allow the cops to get information on hate groups, photograph and videotape demonstrations, and share information with police across the country in monitoring suspected "terrorists."

The 1974 lawsuit which resulted in the Chicago decree revealed that the red squad had routinely "engaged in burglaries, thefts of property and money, blackmail, warrantless wiretaps, illegal arrests [and] provocations." Squad members worked hand in glove with right-wing goon outfits such as the Legion of Justice. Members of the latter group invaded the Chicago offices of the Socialist Workers Party armed with clubs and mace, injuring several people.

The cops provided the legion with mace, tear gas, electronic surveillance equipment, money, and protection for the raids. In return, the legionnaires turned over files, records, and books they seized to the cop agencies.

In a December 1969 pre-dawn raid, Chicago police killed Black Panther Party leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark as they slept in their beds. Court records revealed that the chief of Panther security and Hampton’s bodyguard, William O’Neal, was an FBI infiltrator. O’Neal provided a detailed floor plan of the apartment shortly before the raid.

In 1960 the Chicago cops boasted of having files on 117,000 "local" individuals, 141,000 "out of town" subjects, and 14,000 organizations. The red squad consisted of 500 cops, 600 civilian informants, and 250 occasional informants.  
 
Task force in Portland
In Portland, Oregon, the city council recently defied broad opposition to renew a cooperation agreement between its police department and the FBI known as the Portland Joint Terrorism Task Force. Just days before the council’s approval the Portland Tribune broke a story on police compilation of thousands of files on political activists and groups in the city.

In his presentation to the council supporting renewal of the agreement, city police chief Mark Kroeker pointed to a string of "environmentally related property crimes." Students at the state university had been charged in connection with the arson of logging trucks in Eagle Creek.

Environmental organizations had carried out a three-year campaign to halt the sale of timber from the forest area. Portland Business Alliance representative Tim Crocker also testified in favor of the task force, stating that Oregon faces an increasing threat of "ecoterrorism."

Along with the Eagle Creek arrest, Chief Kroeker also pointed to the arrest of Sheik Mohammed Abdirahman Kariye, religious leader of the city’s largest mosque. Kariye was arrested after cops claimed to have found trace amounts of TNT on his luggage. Test for the substance done by the FBI came back negative a few days after the hearing. The cops later charged Kariye with fraudulent use of a Social Security number.

In March Denver mayor Wellington Webb admitted that city police have "3,200 files on individuals and another 208 records on organizations." The story broke open at a press conference held by the Colorado American Civil Liberties Union.

Among those in the files are a Franciscan nun, the American Friends Service Committee, and the Chiapas Coalition, which organizes support for indigenous groups in Chiapas, Mexico. All three were labeled in the file as "criminal extremists." In face of mounting pressure the mayor issued a statement saying that the cops had gone too far and that "no information about political, religious, or social views, associations, or activities should be collected unless the information relates to criminal activity."  
 
 
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