Jesus Christ, it just never stops. One would think that between USA-PATRIOT and the pending Domestic Security Enhancement Act (often referred to as "Patriot Act II") that the US government would have all of the freedom-crushing tools it could possibly desire.
Nope.
Make way for yet another euphimistically-acronym'd piece of legislative flotsam, the Vital Interdiction of Criminal Terrorist Organisations Act of 2003, or VICTORY Act (Why ask 'Y?' No telling where they got it.)
Introduced by that covergirl of the Big Brother elite, Orrin "Let's nuke their computers!" Hatch, the VICTORY Act is an 89-page legal sledgehammer primarily centered around:
1) Raising the threshold for rejecting illegal wiretaps. The draft reads: "A court may not grant a motion to suppress the contents of a wire or oral communication, or evidence derived therefrom, unless the court finds that the violation of this chapter involved bad faith by law enforcement."
2) Extending subpoena powers by giving giving law enforcement the authority to issue non-judicial subpoenas which require a person suspected of involvement in money laundering to turn over financial records and appear in a prosecutor's office to answer questions.
3) Extending the power of the attorney general to issue so-called administrative "sneak-and-peek" subpoenas to drug cases. These subpoenas allow law enforcement to gather evidence from wire communication, financial records or other sources before the subject of the search is notified.
4) Allow law enforcement to seek a court order to require the "provider of an electronic communication service or remote computing service" or a financial institution to delay notifying a customer that their records had been subpoenaed.
Some of this seems somewhat redundant, which makes me lean towards the idea that in response to the largely vocal backlash against USA-PATRIOT and the haphazrd way in which it was both written and approved, the DoJ and Congress alike are moving to introduce a variety of new measures which support the key points of USA-PATRIOT so that it can be allowed to sunset gracefully at the end of 2005 without actually causing any diminishment in these powers.
Phaedrus
Sources:
ABC News
TownHall.com
Nope.
Make way for yet another euphimistically-acronym'd piece of legislative flotsam, the Vital Interdiction of Criminal Terrorist Organisations Act of 2003, or VICTORY Act (Why ask 'Y?' No telling where they got it.)
Introduced by that covergirl of the Big Brother elite, Orrin "Let's nuke their computers!" Hatch, the VICTORY Act is an 89-page legal sledgehammer primarily centered around:
1) Raising the threshold for rejecting illegal wiretaps. The draft reads: "A court may not grant a motion to suppress the contents of a wire or oral communication, or evidence derived therefrom, unless the court finds that the violation of this chapter involved bad faith by law enforcement."
2) Extending subpoena powers by giving giving law enforcement the authority to issue non-judicial subpoenas which require a person suspected of involvement in money laundering to turn over financial records and appear in a prosecutor's office to answer questions.
3) Extending the power of the attorney general to issue so-called administrative "sneak-and-peek" subpoenas to drug cases. These subpoenas allow law enforcement to gather evidence from wire communication, financial records or other sources before the subject of the search is notified.
4) Allow law enforcement to seek a court order to require the "provider of an electronic communication service or remote computing service" or a financial institution to delay notifying a customer that their records had been subpoenaed.
Some of this seems somewhat redundant, which makes me lean towards the idea that in response to the largely vocal backlash against USA-PATRIOT and the haphazrd way in which it was both written and approved, the DoJ and Congress alike are moving to introduce a variety of new measures which support the key points of USA-PATRIOT so that it can be allowed to sunset gracefully at the end of 2005 without actually causing any diminishment in these powers.
Phaedrus
Sources:
ABC News
TownHall.com
