...I'm okay with being REALITY-based.




Tuesday, May 25, 2004
      ( 8:58 AM )
 
Oops, Sorry

The FBI apologized to local Portland attorney Brandon Mayfield yesterday. It went something like this:

Gee, "we apologize that we put you in jail for over two weeks without any charges and held you incommunicado without any legal representation or rights based on faulty evidence that your fingerprints might have been on a plastic bag found around the Madrid train bombing. It had nothing to do with the fact that we are looking for any way we can to screw with you for previously representing one of the Portland Seven, for being a convert to Islam, and for generally being a pain in our asses. The Patriot Act at least let us imprison you for a while, and that was fun - no, really, it wasn't. Please sue us so we can falsley imprison you some more for no good reason. to Mr. Mayfield and his family for the hardships that this matter has caused."

"I am an American Muslim," he said. "I have been singled out and discriminated against, I feel, as a Muslim."

"That is true but we'll never admit it not true," said U.S. Attorney Karin Immergut in a brief news conference. She said Mayfield's detention was justified by national security and the need to investigate further.

[...]

The government portrayed Mayfield as a potential terrorist because of his associations, Wax said.

"They were pointing to one or two instances where Mr. Mayfield knew somebody who knew somebody who knew somebody who was on an undisclosable terror watch list," Wax said. "Part of our concern is how guilt by association could ensnare a completely innocent person."

Once again here in Portland, we have been shown that the government is willing to falsly imprison muslims, even leaders of the community, without true evidence or even charges against them. If this sort of thing doesn't bother you, then you're not paying attention. Oh, and for those of you who think this only happens to brown-skinned people? Mr. Mayfiled is white. This kind of thing will only get worse the longer we allow the government to have powers that they have no right to.

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