[Infowarrior] - California uses Fed Homeland Security money to track protesters

[Richard Forno]

(c/o D)

California is now getting into the Homeland Security business, with:

1. security contractors tracking protesters (anti-war, animal rights
activists, etc.)
2. creating new and special security clearances for select legislators
3. leaks
4. lying by the executive
4. apologies from the executive (for getting caught?)


July 1: California State tracked protesters in name of terrorism security
by Peter Nicholas
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-me-security1jul01,0,5271977.stor
y?coll=la-editions-inland-news

July 2: Governor to release records of Calif spying on protesters
by Peter Nicholas
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-security2jul02,1,5940914.story?coll=
la-headlines-california&ctrack=1&cset=true





State Tracked Protesters in the Name of Security
Officials say they have stopped monitoring antiwar and political
rallies. The practice violates civil rights, Atty. Gen. Lockyer says.
By Peter Nicholas, Times Staff Writer
July 1, 2006

SACRAMENTO - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's office in charge of
protecting California against terrorism has tracked demonstrations
staged by political and antiwar groups, a practice that senior law
enforcement officials say is an abuse of civil liberties.

The Times obtained reports prepared for the state Office of Homeland
Security in recent months that contain details on the whereabouts and
purpose of a number of political demonstrations throughout California.

The source of the information is listed in some cases as federal law
enforcement agencies, including the Immigration and Customs
Enforcement agency, an investigative arm of the U.S. Homeland
Security department.

Political activities cited in the reports include:

*  An animal rights rally outside a Canadian consulate office in San
Francisco to protest the hunting of seals.

*  A demonstration in Walnut Creek at which U.S. Rep. George Miller
(D-Martinez) and other officials spoke against the war in Iraq.

*  A Women's International League for Peace and Freedom gathering at
a courthouse in Santa Barbara in support of an antiwar protester - a
56-year-old Salinas woman - facing federal trespassing charges.

California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer's office learned of the monitoring
activity more than two months ago. On Friday, a spokesman condemned
the actions, saying they violated the groups' constitutional right of
free speech.

"When people exercise their 1st Amendment rights to rally, march and
protest, they should not have to worry that intelligence officials
are watching them or their activities are in any way being painted
with the terrorism brush," Lockyer spokesman Tom Dresslar said in an
interview.

"That kind of conduct by anti-terrorism intelligence agencies
threatens civil liberties, runs counter to our values and violates
this office's policy regarding criminal intelligence gathering,"
Dresslar said.

The Times obtained two of the reports, which were compiled daily. The
state homeland security office declined to release others.

The office is a 53-person operation that grew out of the Sept. 11
attacks and is financed primarily by federal money. Officials there
said the details about the rallies were reported by SRA
International, a company hired to provide counter-terrorism analysis.

The officials said such information made it into only the two reports
that The Times obtained, out of 60-some daily intelligence reports
produced since March.

No reports were produced before March, said Chris Bertelli, spokesman
for the state office. When officials in the agency learned of the
practice, he said, they ordered it stopped.

Copies of the reports were shared with the California Highway Patrol
and the attorney general's office. Nothing else was done with the
information about the demonstrations, Bertelli said.

The reports are on the letterhead of a California anti-terrorism
partnership that includes the homeland security office, the attorney
general and the Highway Patrol.

Dresslar said staffers in Lockyer's office saw the reports and raised
concerns with their superiors, who complained to the Office of
Homeland Security.

"When we discovered their existence, we informed OHS officials that
we had absolutely no use for that kind of information," Dresslar
said. "Collecting information on protests has no legitimate
anti-terrorism intelligence function. None. No intelligence agency
has any need to maintain this kind of information."

The reports obtained by The Times contain summaries of news articles
about the war in Iraq, animal rights activists and terrorism. One has
a section titled "Upcoming California Protests," followed by
summaries of the demonstrations. Each includes an entry for "officer
safety issues." No issues are cited.

One group whose antiwar rally was in the reports criticized the state
agency's practice.

"It seems like a waste of taxpayer dollars and a creeping invasion of
our 1st Amendment rights to demonstrate and speak," said Devlin
Donnelly, assistant coordinator for the Chico Peace and Justice
Center, which held a rally in Chico in March calling for an end to
the war in Iraq.

Schwarzenegger had "no information and no knowledge that this was
happening," said Adam Mendelsohn, the governor's communications
director. "The governor feels that this particular information
gathering is totally inappropriate and unacceptable."

Anti-terrorism ideas from the state homeland security office have
stirred qualms before.

Past and present members of the attorney general's office said they
were troubled by a meeting at the security office last September in
which federal and state officials discussed ways to prevent Islamic
militants from recruiting prison inmates. In attendance were
officials from the FBI, the state Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation and various local law enforcement agencies, according
to documents obtained by The Times.

One account of the meeting is provided in a whistle-blower complaint
filed by a former high-ranking official in the attorney general's
office, Edward Manavian.

The complaint says homeland security information analyst William
Hipsley proposed monitoring private conversations in state prisons
between inmates and Islamic clergymen and, citing a potential
national security threat from Iran, getting a list of Iranians living
in California.

State law makes it a felony to eavesdrop on conversations between a
person in custody and his attorney, doctor or religious advisor.

Brian Parriott, a spokesman for the state prison system, said it is
not the corrections department's practice to listen in on private
conversations between inmates and visitors from the clergy.

And Mark Schlosberg, a policy director for the ACLU's San Francisco
office, said it is discriminatory to compile databases on broad
groups of people based on national origin without any specific link
to criminal activity.

"It's contrary to our constitutional protections and our systems, and
it's also ineffective in terms of law enforcement," Schlosberg said.

The state homeland security office denied Manavian's version of
events and issued rebuttals from Hipsley and a staff member who also
attended.

In a written statement, Hipsley said that he never suggested "Muslim
clerics offices be 'bugged' " and that the subject of Iran never came
up.

George Aradi, an assistant deputy director for information analysis,
concurred in a separate statement.

Manavian was demoted in February. In his complaint, he said that
happened in part because he refused to cooperate with "attempts to
violate the civil rights of citizens in this state."

He resigned in April. His complaint is pending before the state
Personnel Board, and a hearing is scheduled in late July.

Lockyer's office publicly criticized the monitoring actions after an
inquiry from The Times.

But Allen Benitez, assistant chief of the attorney general's criminal
intelligence bureau, had told one of his bosses in a memo April 18
that the security office was gathering information on "political
groups" and protests. He voiced concerns that such tracking "may not
be allowed under the law."

Lockyer's office handled the matter privately with the security
office, Dresslar said.

Questions about the office come at a time when assessments by
nonpartisan reviewers have concluded the state is unprepared for a
terrorist attack or natural disaster.

Schwarzenegger casts himself as being immersed in efforts to prepare
California for disaster, making repeated public visits to the state's
emergency command center outside Sacramento, where he has watched
over exercises simulating what would happen in a disaster, such as an
earthquake or flood.

But a report by the legislative analyst's office last year said
California lacks "a unified strategic approach to homeland security."

And more recently, the state's Little Hoover Commission watchdog
agency issued a report saying it is unclear who would take charge in
the event of an emergency or terrorist attack.



Governor to Release Intelligence Reports
Schwarzenegger acts to ease concerns about inappropriate compilation
of information on antiwar and political rallies.
By Peter Nicholas, Times Staff Writer

July 2, 2006

SACRAMENTO - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's office said Saturday he was
ordering the release of dozens of intelligence reports prepared for
the state Office of Homeland Security - a step that comes as
lawmakers from both parties are denouncing a practice in which state
intelligence agents compiled information about political and antiwar
protests and rallies.

Schwarzenegger administration officials say there were only two cases
in which state homeland security agents collected material on
political protests in recent months. Releasing the full trove of
intelligence reports will prove that point, assuring the public that
the practice was not more widespread, according to those officials.

State lawmakers from both parties said it was inexcusable that two
such intelligence reports from March and April carried details about
the location and purpose of political rallies throughout California.

The two reports, obtained by The Times, were described in a news
article published Saturday.

"The governor believes that any inappropriate information gathering
like this is totally unacceptable," Adam Mendelsohn, Schwarzenegger's
communications director, said in an interview.

The governor's homeland security director, Matthew Bettenhausen, said
Saturday that the material was mistakenly included in the reports by
a private contractor working for his office.

Schwarzenegger will allow the media to review the approximately 60
intelligence reports that have been prepared for the homeland
security director since March, but no copies will be allowed,
Mendelsohn said.

Before the reports can be reviewed in coming days, officials will
remove all "law-enforcement-sensitive information" - anything
covering "ongoing investigations" and related "safety threats," said
Chris Bertelli, spokesman for the homeland security office.

Rep. George Miller (D-Martinez) said in an interview that there
should be a "very, very high threshold" for removing anything and
that the reports should not be sanitized. The congressman attended an
antiwar rally in Walnut Creek in March that was listed in one of the
intelligence reports, in a section called "Upcoming California
Protests."

State legislators said they were pleased that the governor was
releasing the material.

Yet some said they were troubled by what they viewed as a continuing
pattern of aggressive intelligence gathering by his administration.

Last year, the state Senate held hearings into news accounts that a
California National Guard intelligence unit had tracked a Mother's
Day antiwar rally.

State Sen. Joe Dunn (D-Santa Ana), who led the hearings on the
National Guard, said the homeland security episode is fresh proof of
the need for greater oversight.

Dunn said he wants to create a special legislative intelligence
committee that would monitor California's fast-growing homeland
security apparatus. Lawmakers serving on the committee would receive
a special security clearance. He said he has broached the idea with
the Senate leadership.

"I am very pleased that they're willing to share all the reports,"
Dunn said. "However, I was assured after the one spying incident in
May 2005 by the California National Guard that the practice was not
more widespread at the state level.

"We now discover that those assurances were patently false. I hope
the current assurances are a little more truthful than the ones of a
year ago."

The homeland security office quickly arranged a news conference
Saturday morning to offer some reassurances of its own.

Bettenhausen, a Schwarzenegger appointee, said there was no
surveillance of any of the political demonstrations listed in the
intelligence reports.

One of the rallies was staged by animal rights activists protesting
the slaughter of Canadian seals. Another was a women's peace protest
aimed at showing support for a Salinas woman facing charges of
trespassing at Vandenberg Air Force Base. Several other protests
concerned the war in Iraq.

The two reports from March and April that mentioned the political
demonstrations were shared with the California Highway Patrol and the
attorney general's office, but not with any other law enforcement
entity, Bettenhausen said.

These two agencies are part of a state partnership set up to combat
terrorism and gather intelligence.

Bettenhausen described how the material made its way into the reports.

A state contractor retained by homeland security issued a report
March 7. That document included summaries of 10 rallies set for later
in the month. Listed were the date of the event, the purpose, the
location, the expected number of people, the source of the
information, and "officer safety issues."

When they saw that, homeland security officials told the contractor
not to include such information again, Bettenhausen said.

Yet similar material was part of a report dated April 10. Again,
homeland security officials saw it and told the contractor to leave
out such information in the future, Bettenhausen said.

Since then, none of the reports prepared for Bettenhausen have
included information on political protests, homeland security
officials said.

Bettenhausen said his office "does not tolerate the gathering of
inappropriate information and we never will. We will not stand for
it."

The contractor used by the state homeland security agency is SRA
International Inc., which is being paid up to $16 million to provide
counterterrorism analysis.