NSA Trial Evidence 'Riddled With Boxes and Arrows' 108
decora writes "In the Espionage Act trial of NSA IT Whistleblower Thomas Drake, the main evidence against him are five documents he allegedly 'willfully retained' in his basement. The government, for the first time, is using the Silent Witness Rule to 'substitute' words in this evidence so that the public will not be able to see the allegedly sensitive information. The result of this 'substitution' process has been described by the defense as a tangled mess of boxes, arrows, and code words [PDF] that will impossibly confuse the facts of the case. 'Two weeks before trial, Mr. Drake and his counsel still do not know what evidence the jury will see.'"
Rights? (Score:5, Insightful)
Tangled mess of .. (Score:5, Insightful)
...boxes, arrows and code words.
For some reason, this reminds me of:
We walked in, sat down, Obie came in with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one, sat down. Man came in said, "All rise." We all stood up, and Obie stood up with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures, and the judge walked in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he sat down, we sat down. Obie looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog. And then at twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry, 'cause Obie came to the realization that it was a typical case of American blind justice, and there wasn't nothing he could do about it, and the judge wasn't going to look at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And we was fined $50 and had to pick up the garbage in the snow, but thats not what I came to tell you about.
From Alice' Restaurant [arlo.net] by Arlo Guthrie.
Security Clearances (Score:3, Insightful)
These sorts of trials/prosecutions, where the USG invokes national security to avoid presenting evidence, are becoming all too common. We currently have 800,000+ citizens with TS clearances (http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/). I used to. I'd be happy to serve on a jury in these situations and I assume many other folks would too. With that many people to draw from I would think we could find a good jury pool and give people a fair trial instead of dropping charges or kangaroo courts. It would be slightly more expensive, but I don't understand why this couldn't work.
Re:Rights? (Score:5, Insightful)
When they reach the point that every family "on the dole" has multiple surveillance cameras throughout their homes, then we will have reached 1984.
Orwell's portrayal of cameras in homes was simply one of many, many totalitarian ideas he wove into the story. A large number of them exist today (the most obvious examples being pacification of the "proles" by means of 24-hour media, and constant war with vague enemies about vague things). To say that we won't have his version of society until we have that one thing is pretty odd. That's like saying we won't have Christmas until somebody gets drunk.
So, lets see (Score:4, Insightful)
OK, the government is allowed to present fabricated evidence to the jury IFF the information is otherwise classified, secret, or the government suggests it's better not published, based on the government's say-so, but only if they pinkie swear that there is real evidence somewhere and it's bad news for the defendant? I'm sure that'll NEVER get abused!
If the jury actually understands what is happening, they would have no choice but to acquit, since they won't be shown actual evidence of anything. Since the prosecutor wouldn't bother with a sure loss, I'm guessing the strategy is to confuse the jury as much as possible and smile a lot.
The interesting thing here is that they don't feel they can show these documents to 12 citizens and ask them to keep it quiet for the good of their country. That means either they believe citizens are to be managed like children, or that the information doesn't need to be classified in the first place, or perhaps that it's classified because it would reveal misdeeds on the part of some people in power (that the citizens probably SHOULD know about).
So, is the defendant allowed to present a blank piece of paper if he swears it represents a full confession to trumping up the charges and baby raping on the part of the prosecution if he also swears there's secret stuff in it?