Bob Egelko reports: Challenging a California law that requires police to collect the DNA of all suspected felons, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer told a federal appeals court Tuesday that the government should not be allowed to take the “genetic blueprint” of someone who hasn’t been convicted of a crime. One-third of the 300,000…
Category: U.S.
NY: Lawmakers vote to limit NYPD stop-and-frisk data
Michael Virtanen of the Associated Press reports: State lawmakers have passed legislation to prohibit the New York City Police Department from keeping personal information in its database on individuals who have been stopped and frisked by police without arrest or further legal action. Sponsors said information from the department’s street stops, mainly of blacks and…
ACLU Study Highlights U.S. Surveillance Society
David Kravets reports: Welcome to the surveillance society. That’s what the American Civil Liberties Union concluded Tuesday with a report chronicling government spying and the detention of groups and individuals “for doing little more than peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights.” The report, Policing Free Speech: Police Surveillance and Obstruction of First Amendment-Protected Activity (.pdf),…
Opposition rails against bill giving U.S. say over Canadian air travellers
Kevin Dougherty reports: QUEBEC — The Harper government has quietly presented a bill in the House of Commons that would give U.S. officials final say over who may board aircraft in Canada if they are to fly over the U.S. en route to a third country. “Canadian sovereignty has gone right out the window,” Liberal…