Posted on 01/25/2006 12:05:00 PM PST by danno3150
Newton officials are calling their refusal to allow FBI agents access to library computers without a warrant during a terrorist threat last week “their finest hour.”
Law enforcement officials say it’s a “nightmare.”
Police rushed to the Newton Free Library after tracing a terrorist threat e-mailed to Brandeis University to a computer at the library.
But requests to examine computers Jan. 18 were rebuffed by Newton library Director Kathy Glick-Weil and Mayor David Cohen on the grounds that they did not have a warrant.
Cohen, defending the library’s actions, called the legal standoff one of Newton’s “finest hours.”
“We showed you can enforce the law — without jeopardizing the privacy of innocent citizens,” the mayor said.
It took U.S. attorneys several hours to finally secure a warrant, Glick-Weil said, and they took the computer from the library at about 11:30 that night, after the library had closed.
Brandeis received the alleged e-mail threat at about 11 a.m., according to Waltham Lt. Brian Navin. While police reportedly didn’t find anything threatening after evacuating 12 buildings at Brandeis and a nearby elementary school, by about 2 p.m., the e-mail was traced to a computer at the Newton Free Library.
Newton police, followed shortly by FBI and state police officers, rushed to the library to lock the building down, Glick-Weil said.
“There was a lot of excitement going on,” she said.
An FBI spokesman, as well as Lt. Bruce Apotheker of the Newton police, both said their offices would not comment on the investigation.
But a law enforcement official close to the investigation said in an e-mail the confrontation was a “nightmare.”
Nancy Murray, director of education for the Boston branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, said she was surprised the FBI asked for information without a warrant.
“They couldn’t possibly expect to get (the computer) without a warrant,” she said. “Good for the library for knowing more about warrants than the police.”
Yeah, thanks. 'But I still think it would be a hoot to have them receive a couple of hundred thousand emails from--gasp---the Red states.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Looks pretty simple to me.
The FBI could have and should have gotten a warrant before going to the library.
I'm far from siding with the liberals on most anything, but I am strongly on the side of the Constitution, and this looks pretty cut and dried.
We certainly would hope so!!!!
I wonder if he would have continued to feel so smug and justified if terrorists did in fact attack the Brandeis campus, after he had refused the FBI's request to follow up the threat?
These elitist maroons disgust me.
It's cut and dried that the FBI needed a warrant to perform a search without consent, and they went and got one. I think what is irritating to most people on this thread (me, anyway) is that the library did not consent to the search.
"Don't tempt me, Frodo"!!
BUMP
Probable cause.
Even Ms. Glick-Weil has heard of probable cause:
Kathy Glick-Weil, director of the Newton Free Library, said she opposes the government having the authority to search an individual's library records without probable cause and worries that the law compromises the library's traditional role of promoting the free exchange of information and ideas. 8/21/2003
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2003/08/21/librarians_fight_search_law/
The Mayor and Librarian acted like an outraged homeowners instead of cooperative public officials.
So WTH is going on down in Mass. that it takes several hours to secure a warrant in a situation such as this?
This attitude among law enforcement that the Constitution which they swore an oath to support and defend is a "nightmare" is rather disturbing to me, but I reckon it's par for the course in Massachusetts.
Ah! Because a person chose to exercise their rights under the the Constitution it makes it bad.
Got it, but I'm not in agreement.
If it were me, I might have agreed to the search given the circumstances if it were explained reasonably, but since I wasn't, I'll go with door number 1.
It's a judge's call to define probable cause, not a librarian's - that's why law enforcement officials are required to secure a warrant before conducting searches.
We're at war, if you hadn't noticed.
If someone had died, because of their nonsense...
actually, if I agree that law enforcement can search my home, then they can search my home. I don't need a judge to tell me whether or not it is reasonable. I have that option, of course. But a library is a public institution. No one should expect that anything they do in a library would remain private. I never have. Whether the feds have a right to go into a local library and order folks around is another matter. Local cops should have been able to do it. But that's just my opinion.
Which would apply if the perpetrator owned the computer.
If the FBI asked by boss to inspect my computer at work, he could say yes without violating my 4th amendment rights.
Since they are the library's computers, which are in effect the government's computers, they can and should agree.
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