吃瓜直播

The case of David Miranda got a lot of attention around the world after UK authorities were accused of abusing an anti-terrorism law to evade the normal constitutional restrains on police power and question someone because of their political associations. Well, a very similar abuse of power appears to have happened here in the United States.

Today we are releasing new government documents that provide rare insight into how the government uses its powers at the border to search and seize Americans鈥� electronic devices. The documents, obtained by our client David House as a result of his lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security, demonstrate how the government is abusing its border search authority to evade constitutional restrictions on its surveillance powers. (You can see the documents here.)

House was stopped at Chicago鈥檚 O'Hare International Airport coming back from vacation in November 2010. At the time, he was working with the Bradley Manning Support Network, which was raising funds for the legal defense of the soldier who has since plead guilty to providing classified documents to WikiLeaks. DHS agents detained House, interrogated him about his political activities and beliefs, and then seized his laptop computer, mobile phone, camera, and USB drive. The agents returned House鈥檚 phone after inspecting it, but the government kept the rest of his devices for seven weeks while agents searched his files for evidence. Even after the government returned House鈥檚 physical devices, it continued to actively investigate copies of his files for nearly six more months.

The 吃瓜直播 and the 吃瓜直播 of Massachusetts filed a federal lawsuit on House鈥檚 behalf arguing that the government targeted House solely because of his association with the Bradley Manning Support Network, violating both his First Amendment right to freedom of association and his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.

In March 2012, the judge in the case denied the government鈥檚 motion to dismiss the lawsuit, holding that even though the government does not need suspicion or a warrant to search people鈥檚 electronic devices at the border, that power is not unlimited and First Amendment rights still apply. After months of negotiations, House and the government inked a settlement agreement in May 2013. As part of that agreement, the government agreed to destroy all of the data it got from House鈥檚 electronics, and also turn over documents related to its investigation of House and the search of his devices.

The settlement documents reveal that an agent with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI)鈥攁n Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) subdivision that is now the second largest law enforcement agency in the United States鈥攅ntered a 鈥渓ookout鈥� into a government database called TECS (see the document here), effectively notifying government agents throughout the country that House was wanted for questioning in connection with the Department of Justice鈥檚 investigation into Manning and WikiLeaks. As a result of the lookout, which was linked to the , HSI later received an automated notification that House would be traveling outside the country and that he would return through O鈥橦are on November 3, 2010.

House鈥檚 case provides a perfect example of how the government uses its border search authority to skirt the protections afforded by the Fourth Amendment. The government enjoys wider latitude to search people and their belongings at the border than it possesses elsewhere, for the purpose of protecting our borders. But the settlement documents demonstrate that the seizure of House鈥檚 computer was unrelated to border security or customs enforcement. It was simply an opportunity to conduct a suspicionless search that no court would ever have approved inside the country.

The records also show that HSI was acting in cooperation with鈥攁nd perhaps at the request of鈥攖he Department of Justice, the Department of State, and the Army鈥檚 Criminal Investigative Division, not to protect our borders but to further a domestic investigation of the WikiLeaks disclosures. House鈥檚 connection to Manning through the Bradley Manning Support Network made him a target of that investigation. The government then used its access to airline passenger information to learn when and where David House, and others, would be traveling across our border (see the document here), and laid in wait to seize his computer and other electronic devices.

Electronic device searches are substantially more invasive than traditional border searches, which is why this particularly intrusive form of government surveillance should not be conducted without reasonable suspicion. The documents show how, using sophisticated forensics software, the government can conduct comprehensive and intrusive searches of the large number of personal documents stored on today鈥檚 electronic devices. In this case, the government searched House鈥檚 electronics for 183 keywords, turning up more than 26,000 potentially responsive 鈥渇iles/objects鈥�. But even the government鈥檚 own analysis of House鈥檚 information concluded that 鈥渘o data was found that constituted evidence of a crime (and would justify ICE鈥檚 seizure of the materials).鈥�

The fact that an American crosses the border should not be an excuse for the government to scour his most personal files or to seize his electronics for a prolonged period of time. A federal appeals court that the forensic examination of a person鈥檚 laptop is so 鈥渃omprehensive and intrusive鈥� that the government should not be allowed to search such devices at the border without reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing.

The documents expose the government鈥檚 process for searching electronic devices at the border鈥攁nd it is not reassuring. Although the government reports searching thousands of electronic devices a year at the border, the details of how it conducts these searches have been largely kept secret so far. ICE鈥檚 policy states that electronic device searches should generally be completed within 30 days, but it took some seven months for the government to complete its search of House鈥檚 information and conclude that there was no evidence of wrongdoing data. During that period, House鈥檚 devices were imaged multiple times and shared with another government agency, the Army Criminal Investigation Division.

Unfortunately, House鈥檚 case is not an isolated incident. The that 4,957 passengers had their electronic devices searched between October 1, 2012 and August 31, 2013, and an additional 4,898 individuals were subject to electronic device searches the previous year.

We have no way of knowing how many of those searches may have been carried out not to search for contraband鈥攚hich is the reason ICE has been granted such broad search powers鈥攂ut to exploit border search powers to evade the Constitution.