A Nation of Informers

New York Times ^ | 9/23/02 | ADAM LIPTAK

[kattracks]

HAT should Eunice Stone have done?

As she was having breakfast at a Shoney's restaurant in Calhoun, Ga., one day earlier this month, she said she overheard a conversation among the three men in the next booth that alarmed her.

So Ms. Stone, a nurse from Cartersville, Ga., called the police and said that she heard the men discussing terrorism plans. As a consequence, law enforcement officials closed down the Interstate highway known as Alligator Alley and detained the men for the better part of a day. The men, who were Muslim medical students on their way to a hospital in Miami, endured a thorough search of their cars for explosives and intense public scrutiny before they were released.

Ms. Stone has been praised for her alertness as well as criticized for what civil-liberties advocates said was paranoia. She has hired lawyers. Yet Ms. Stone was clearly heeding the call of government officials, from President Bush on down, who have asked citizens to be vigilant and report anything suspicious.

It is hard to know how to calculate the costs and benefits of encouraging tips like that of Ms. Stone's, said Cass R. Sunstein, a law professor at the University of Chicago.

"There are two things to balance," he said. "One is the likelihood that you'll get good information that will prevent harm. The other is that you will get people in trouble who don't deserve to be or that you will create a culture of surveillance."

It is not difficult to identify in hindsight tips that should have been made but were not. After Sept. 11, 2001, for instance, a federal Department of Agriculture official in Florida was criticized for failing to report a charged encounter in 2000 with Mohamed Atta, believed to be the ringleader of the terrorist attacks. Other people came forward after Sept. 11 with stories about disturbing encounters with the hijackers that they did not report.

Last week, after the arrests of six Arab-American men from Lackawanna, N.Y., who are accused of being members of a Qaeda cell, New York state established a toll-free hotline for reporting suspicious activity. Information from within the Yemeni community in Lackawanna seems to have played a role in the arrests.

James McMahon, the superintendent of the New York State Police, said people should err on the side of passing along information, even if it is based only on "instincts and intuition."

But is it possible to be too vigilant? Does the flood of resulting tips obscure or even reduce, as the boy who cried wolf learned, the truly valuable information?

Even Gov. George E. Pataki sounded a little wary about the hotline when he announced it, asking people to use it "responsibly and with common sense."

Civil libertarians said that may be asking too much of the public.

"We will find ourselves falling into anarchy if we ask ordinary people to play the role that only law enforcement officials can play properly," said Anthony D. Romero, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union.

But others say such comments exaggerate and overreach.

"Informing in a country where thought crimes are criminal is one thing," said Charles Fried, a law professor at Harvard. "Informing in a country where the only crimes are menaces to public security in a physical sense is very different."

Mr. Sunstein said there was no need for alarmism. "I think our culture is strong enough that the likelihood that this will create serious problems for our freedom is very low,"` he said.

Those upon whom suspicion is cast have little legal recourse. It is permissible to contact the authorities with leads based on misunderstandings or ill-founded suspicions.

Various legal claims may be available in theory, experts said, among them defamation, infliction of emotional distress and malicious prosecution. But they are not likely to succeed. In most states and in most situations, plaintiffs must prove not only that the tip was false but that the informer knew or suspected that at the time and meant to harm the subject of the tip.

In the current environment, said Prof. Rodney A. Smolla of the University of Richmond School of Law, "there is not much realistic exposure to liability, though it would depend on the pointedness of the tip." A purposefully false accusation of training pilots for terror missions, he said, might be treated differently from the voicing of more generalized suspicions.

It gets more complicated when suspicions result in fights and imprisonment, as in the case of two men of Indian descent who were jailed in Arkansas earlier this month after a Northwest Airlines flight attendant grew concerned about their trips to the airplane bathroom. They may be able to sue the airline and the government for malicious prosecution or false imprisonment.

"It all turns on the question of probable cause," said Richard D. Emery, a civil rights lawyer.

Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said untrained civilians are more likely to engage in racial stereotyping.

"There is a real chill in the Muslim community about what will be taken as an innocent comment," Mr. Hooper said.

And not all tips are made in good faith, he said.

"We've had reports of cases where people use tips as payback on the job," Mr. Hooper said. "We see it in custody cases, where people make all kinds of allegations against others if they're Muslims."

But false accusations are a part of law enforcement, Mr. McMahon said, and that is where police investigative skills come in. "Whether it comes in as a tip, a 911 call or over a seven-digit number, you're going to get false reports," he said.

If there are to be errors, Mr. McMahon said, they should be on the side of too much information.

"There are probably going to be a lot of tips that come in baseless," he said. "I'd rather hear about it."

[DWSUWF]

"..."There is a real chill in the Muslim community about what will be taken as an innocent comment," Mr. Hooper said..."

Too bad the "chill in the moslem community" isn't the winter wind whipping their smelly burquas and faggish man-dresses as they stand huddled on a railroad siding waiting for the train that will take them to the boat which will take them ANYWHERE but here.

[decimon]

I'm not going to get into the issue of Japanese American internment...

Internment is for resident aliens.

[Jake0001]

Of course here in Texas its illegal to NOT report POSSIBLE child abuse. Which makes all teachers, hospital personel and daycare people possible snoops for CPS.

The most dangerous thing is for a child to "joke" about an injury.

I guess it's just plain illegal to "joke" anymore.

[Fury]

She just decided to report them anyway because they pissed her off.

That's conjecture on your part.

The lady, rightly or wrongly, made a decision on the information available at hand, and after her son said to her that he thought the men were joking around. The men may have the "right" to say what they want and joke around, but many citizens believe they have a responsibility to report such incidents to law enforcement. The above two concepts are not mutually exclusive.

[MHGinTN]

It is odd that you have chosen to focus on the comment from her son that 'he knew they were joking' ... I have a son and if I thought there was any chance of the threat being real, I wouldn't back off just because my son was convinced there was a joke in play, because I won't weigh my son's judgement (which might be colored by 'just don't get involved' or 'why bother', except my son is even more on the alert than I am since he works in a military instillation) against the possible consequences of not acting, not reporting the possibility to the authorities.

I sure hope and pray there are fifty-thousand Eunices to every one of your ilk. Personally, I'm now profiling and keeping my eyes and ears open. Thank you, Eunice!

[Consort]

No, I'd use my common sense, like the informant's son did.

The son is a cop out; his mother did the right thing. Walk into any police department and ask a cop or a detective about the importance of informers in convicting the bad guys.

[demkicker]

"It's not false to say that her son told his mother, "Oh, mama, they're just messing with you."

It is false to claim "If her son could tell they were fooling with her, she should have been able to see it too. In fact, she could see it, it just pissed her off. So she struck out at them for what she saw as their arrogance."

You sorry assumption is just that... a sorry assumption, in other words, a false claim.

"And I don't know how brave you have to be to inform on someone after they left the restaurant."

You're really flashing now... It's brave to step up to the plate and put up with bigoted and critical remarks by fools. Not knowing these men, she had no idea if their remarks were a hoax or not. She didn't feel like chancing the risk. I hope you'll never be put in a similar situation. You've made it very clear that you would make the wrong choice.

[John Lenin]

It's not false to say that her son told his mother, "Oh, mama, they're just messing with you." And I don't know how brave you have to be to inform on someone after they left the restaurant.

You have repeated this statement 73 times. Looks like you are the only one who believes it.

[demkicker]

Geeze, even if DentsRun responds, I'm tired of trying to have a resonable exchange with someone who is incapable of reasoning! Aaaaaack!

[DentsRun]

Not knowing these men, she had no idea if their remarks were a hoax or not. She didn't feel like chancing the risk. I hope you'll never be put in a similar situation. You've made it very clear that you would make the wrong choice.

Since 9-11 a lot of people are jumping at their own shadows. They justify their paranoia (and their informing on fellow Americans) on the grounds that "we're all at terrible risk." Well, we're not at risk. Or in any case we have far less to fear from Saddam Hussein than we do from fellow Americans who love to genuflect to authority.

[DentsRun]

Not knowing these men, she had no idea if their remarks were a hoax or not. She didn't feel like chancing the risk. I hope you'll never be put in a similar situation. You've made it very clear that you would make the wrong choice.

Well I hope one choice I never make is jumping at my own shadow. Since 9-11 a lot of people are justifying their paranoia (and their informing on fellow Americans) on the grounds that "we're all at terrible risk." Well, we're not at terrible risk and people who think that have been watching too much TV. In any case we have far less to fear from Saddam Hussein than we do from fellow Americans who seem to think there's no freedoms not worth sacrificing for an (infinitessimal) increase in security.

[DentsRun]

I have a son and if I thought there was any chance of the threat being real, I wouldn't back off just because my son was convinced there was a joke in play, because I won't weigh my son's judgement (which might be colored by 'just don't get involved' or 'why bother', except my son is even more on the alert than I am since he works in a military instillation) against the possible consequences of not acting, not reporting the possibility to the authorities.

My personal opinion is that Osama Bin Laden has achieved far more than he ever dreamed possible--he's got half the country jumping at shadows and the rest of us informing on our neighbors. Some people even applauded the idea of having mailmen and cable installers spying on their customers. I must say I don't think the people who wrote the Bill of Rights would be very impressed.

[DentsRun]

You have repeated this statement 73 times. Looks like you are the only one who believes it.

When it comes to informing on one's fellow Americans, some cautions bear repeating.

[DentsRun]

The men may have the "right" to say what they want and joke around, but many citizens believe they have a responsibility to report such incidents to law enforcement. The above two concepts are not mutually exclusive.

Well, I agree. I also think it's no service to America to turn ourselves into an informer state in an unattainable quest for perfect security.

[PoorMuttly]

I'm telling.

[demkicker]

There you go again! Repeating yourself in posts 90 & 91... Give it up and go pour yourself another one.

[nopardons]

Did you know, that during the Revolution, people turned in those, whom they though were colaborating with England ? If it was good enough then, it's good enough now.

[DentsRun]

Give it up and go pour yourself another one.

At last we agree.

[DentsRun]

Did you know, that during the Revolution, people turned in those, whom they though were colaborating with England ? If it was good enough then, it's good enough now.

Maybe when Ashcroft asks congress to fund the "Snitch Nation" task force you can testify on its behalf.

[CIB-173RDABN]

I am with Eunice.

The whole point of this type of story, and people line DentsRun is to make us second guess ourselfs next time.

If someone should overhear some real terrorist, they may second guess calling the police in fear that they will be scorned, or called racist and bigots.

I say phooey on those that doubt Eunice's actions and motives. To me, they are in league with the terrorist, doing whatever it takes to weaken us, and make it easier for them to attack us in the future.

Well I got news for them, as a conservative Republican for more years then I care to think of, I have been called many names by the left, including racist, bigotted, and so, and you know what, it is meaningless.

If I overheard something that gave me the impression that there was going to be a terrorist act, I would not hesitate to call the police.

Just keep in mind this is all just a tactic to wear us down, and make us easier targets.