Fwd: ZGram - 4/22/2003 - "Go directly to jail, crime or no"

[zgrams at zgrams.zundelsite.org]

>Date: Tue, 22 Apr 2003 18:46:51 -0700
>To: zgram-freedomsite.org
>From: Ingrid Rimland <irimland at mail.bellsouth.net>
>Subject: ZGram - 4/22/2003 - "Go directly to jail, crime or no"
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>ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny:  Now more than ever!
>
>April 22, 2003
>
>Good Morning from the Zundelsite:
>
>This story has a familiar ring.  It appeared in the St. Petersburg 
>Times on April 20, 2003 and was written by Robin E. Blumner:
>
>[START]
>
>Sometimes, before an abusive government practice gains widespread 
>attention, bad things have to happen to someone with this bio: 
>American citizen, blond wife, adorable children, good job and 
>high-status friends.
>
>That victim would be Maher "Mike" Hawash, a naturalized American of 
>Palestinian descent who has been held in federal custody as a 
>material witness to a terrorism investigation since March 20.
>
>In an early-morning raid, Hawash was seized by armed FBI agents in 
>the parking lot of his workplace in Portland, Ore. His home was 
>later searched for hours and four computers were confiscated. Hawash 
>has since been held under maximum-security conditions in a federal 
>prison south of Portland. No one who can talk knows why Hawash has 
>been detained or what the FBI agents are looking into, although 
>there is conjecture it might have something to do with his donations 
>to a Muslim charity. Everyone directly associated with the case, 
>including his lawyers, has been ordered by a judge not to speak 
>about it.
>
>But Hawash is lucky. Unlike other Muslim and Middle Eastern men who 
>have found themselves in this predicament, Hawash has well-situated 
>friends. As a former employee and now a contract software engineer 
>for Intel Corp., Hawash has a wide cadre of associates in the 
>computer industry. And they are not sitting on their hands. An 
>Internet-driven information campaign (www.freemikehawash.org) and 
>organized "free Mike" rallies have increased interest in his case 
>and, as a result, in the way Attorney General John Ashcroft has been 
>misusing the material witness statute.
>
>Steven McGeady, a former Intel vice president, is leading the effort 
>on Hawash's behalf. McGeady said he had been a casual observer of 
>the post-Sept. 11 terrorism detentions -- concerned but not engaged. 
>His activism kicked in when his good friend was arrested. What 
>happened to Hawash "is the classical definition of a police state," 
>McGeady said. "Government can hold you in secret at any time and for 
>any length of time. It violates, for me and everyone I know, the 
>pre-existing trust we have in government." McGeady believes firmly 
>that if Hawash were "not of Arabic descent" he would never have been 
>treated in this pre-emptory manner: Instead of waiting in a prison 
>cell, "he'd be home waking up with his wife and kids every morning."
>
>At issue in Hawash's case is the 1984 material witness statute that 
>allows the government to hold a person whose testimony is "material 
>in a criminal proceeding" for an indeterminate time. The law is to 
>be used only when the witness is reticent and will likely flee the 
>country to avoid having to testify. But since the terror attacks 
>Ashcroft has transformed it into a tool of repression, using it to 
>put people behind bars for preventive detention. Ashcroft's approach 
>is to arrest first, investigate possible terrorist ties later -- a 
>patently unconstitutional practice under which the "witness" label 
>has become just a pretext.
>
>Back in November, the Washington Post did a stellar job trying to 
>uncover exactly how Ashcroft's Justice Department has used the 
>statute. The paper counted at least 44 people who were arrested as 
>material witnesses -- a remarkable journalistic achievement given 
>that it is nearly impossible to get information on who has been 
>arrested. Because the detentions are ostensibly to provide grand 
>jury testimony, judges seal the records and issue gag orders. It 
>plays perfectly into Ashcroft's obsession with secrecy.
>
>The paper found that twenty of the "witnesses" were released without 
>ever being asked to appear before a grand jury. And only two were 
>ever indicted on terrorism-related charges. (Another, Jose Padilla, 
>the so-called "dirty bomber," is being held without charge as an 
>enemy combatant.)
>
>Lives and families were destroyed by the incarcerations, with some 
>of the detentions lasting for months. Yet this statute imprisons 
>people who are not accused of doing anything wrong.
>
>As to checks on Ashcroft, Congress has been exceptionally meek. 
>Earlier this month House Judiciary Committee Chairman James 
>Sensenbrenner and ranking member John Conyers sent Ashcroft a letter 
>asking for details regarding each person detained as a material 
>witness. But this is likely to go nowhere. Congress has been 
>unwilling to call Ashcroft to account for his outrages against 
>liberty. Nearly everyone's intimidated.
>
>The courts have been a little better but not much. One federal judge 
>in New York ruled that the material witness statute could not be 
>used in the grand jury context, but that ruling is likely to be set 
>aside on appeal. Courts seem to be failing to vigilantly test the 
>government's claim that the men held on these warrants are a flight 
>risk. Hawash is an American with a good job, a nice home, an 
>American-born wife and three children. He's got just the kind of 
>vita that says he would be a cooperative witness.
>
>A federal judge has ordered Hawash detained "but not indefinitely," 
>with a closed-door hearing to review his status set for April 29. By 
>that time he will have spent more than five weeks in prison with no 
>formal accusation or charge against him. Welcome to Ashcroft's 
>America.
>
>[END]