Interesting People mailing list archives
Only preventing fees?
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Thu, 14 Feb 2008 05:25:00 -0800
________________________________________ From: James S. Tyre [jstyre () eff org] Sent: Wednesday, February 13, 2008 2:09 PM To: Kevin Bankston; Brad Templeton Cc: eff-priv () eff org; David Farber Subject: Re: [E-PRV] Only preventing fees? (Adding in Dave Farber as I just noticed that one of his readers made the same completely false and boneheaded statement about immunity v. fees.) At 10:33 AM 2/13/2008 -0800, Kevin Bankston wrote:
On Feb 13, 2008, at 10:22 AM, Brad Templeton wrote:Ok, so now two differnt people have written that this senate bill does not provide immunity, but does block class action fees. Of course if that were true we would continue with our case as before.Hi Brad--Who has written that? It is completely false. Put somewhat simplistically (so don't quote me), the Senate Bill allows the AG to obtain dismissal of all claims against communications providers based on his secret certification to the court that the alleged conduct was authorized by the President between Sep 01 and Jan 07 for the purpose of anti-terrorism and had been determined to be legal (or, alternatively, that the alleged conduct didn't occur).
Exact text: SEC. 202. LIMITATIONS ON CIVIL ACTIONS FOR ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATION SERVICE PROVIDERS. (a) Limitations- (1) IN GENERAL- Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a covered civil action shall not lie or be maintained in a Federal or State court, and shall be promptly dismissed, if the Attorney General certifies to the court that-- (A) the assistance alleged to have been provided by the electronic communication service provider was-- (i) in connection with an intelligence activity involving communications that was-- (I) authorized by the President during the period beginning on September 11, 2001, and ending on January 17, 2007; and (II) designed to detect or prevent a terrorist attack, or activities in preparation for a terrorist attack, against the United States; and (ii) described in a written request or directive from the Attorney General or the head of an element of the intelligence community (or the deputy of such person) to the electronic communication service provider indicating that the activity was-- (I) authorized by the President; and (II) determined to be lawful; or (B) the electronic communication service provider did not provide the alleged assistance. (2) REVIEW- A certification made pursuant to paragraph (1) shall be subject to review by a court for abuse of discretion. (b) Review of Certifications- If the Attorney General files a declaration under section 1746 of title 28, United States Code, that disclosure of a certification made pursuant to subsection (a) would harm the national security of the United States, the court shall-- (1) review such certification in camera and ex parte; and (2) limit any public disclosure concerning such certification, including any public order following such an ex parte review, to a statement that the conditions of subsection (a) have been met, without disclosing the subparagraph of subsection (a)(1) that is the basis for the certification. (c) Nondelegation- The authority and duties of the Attorney General under this section shall be performed by the Attorney General (or Acting Attorney General) or a designee in a position not lower than the Deputy Attorney General. (d) Civil Actions in State Court- A covered civil action that is brought in a State court shall be deemed to arise under the Constitution and laws of the United States and shall be removable under section 1441 of title 28, United States Code. (e) Rule of Construction- Nothing in this section may be construed to limit any otherwise available immunity, privilege, or defense under any other provision of law. (f) Effective Date and Application- This section shall apply to any covered civil action that is pending on or filed after the date of enactment of this Act.
Is this referring to the proposal we talked about which would limit damages only to individuals who specifically were targetted by the program and give immunity for snooping on people caught in the dragnet?I'm afraid I don't recall any such proposal--it's not one that we would make, considering our class members were likely not specifically targeted--but regardless, the answer is no.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- James S. Tyre jstyre () jstyre com Law Offices of James S. Tyre 310-839-4114/310-839-4602(fax) 10736 Jefferson Blvd., #512 Culver City, CA 90230-4969 Co-founder, The Censorware Project http://censorware.net Policy Fellow, Electronic Frontier Foundation http://www.eff.org ------------------------------------------- Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/ Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
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- Only preventing fees? David Farber (Feb 14)