A “Terrorist” Who Wasn’t

blog

Posted by Connor on December 5th, 2006

The Christian Science Monitor is carrying a story about the FBI shelling out $2 million to Oregon lawyer Brandon Mayfield “as part of a settlement for wrongfully arresting him in connection with the 2004 Madrid terror attacks.”

Mayfield is a convert to Islam, born here in America. He describes the ordeal he was put through:

The days, weeks and months following my arrest were some of the darkest we have had to endure. I personally was subject to lockdown, strip searches, sleep deprivation, unsanitary living conditions, shackles and chains, threats, physical pain and humiliation.

What evidence was the FBI going off of?

FBI examiners had erroneously linked him to a partial fingerprint on a bag of detonators found after terrorists bombed commuter trains in Madrid in March, killing 191 people. The bureau compounded its error by stridently resisting the conclusions of the Spanish National Police, which notified the FBI three weeks before Mayfield was arrested that the fingerprint did not belong to him.

Yup, that’s right… The FBI has wasted plenty of time and resources chasing this man based on a single fingerprint, and now they’re paying out an extra $2 million of our money.

The JBS’ commentary brings home the point quite well:

Undoubtedly there are many Americans who are not overly concerned about the extra-constitutional powers the federal government has been exercising to bring terrorists to justice for the simple reason that they do not imagine that those powers would ever be used against the innocent. Suspension of habeas corpus? Imprisonment without being charged with a crime? Torture? Many Americans who would ordinarily be appalled by these extra-constitutional powers rationalize that the powers are necessary when exercised against suspected terrorists.

After all, the federal government would never accuse someone of being a terrorist who is not a terrorist — or would it?

Well, it already has.

At what point do we shed the prevalent mentality of “It could never happen to me”? At what point do we realize that if it has happened just once, it’s likely to happen again?

Thankfully, Mayfield is resuming his lawsuit against the government to overturn the (unconstitutional and ridiculous) Patriot Act. Here’s to hoping he sees some success after being put through hell by our government.

Did you enjoy this article? Read Latter-day Liberty!

***************

Related Posts (automatically generated)

The Constitution Applies to Terrorists

One courageous individual has opined already. Care to pontificate as well?

Concerning the Patriot Act – - Ask yourself the following questions:

Who authored the 800+ page Patriot Act? When was the 800+ page Patriot Act written?

Most Americans believe that the 800+ page Patriot Act was written after 9/11, and was passed through both houses of Congress 7 weeks later.

Is this logical? No Congressman had a chance to even read the 800+ page Patriot Act before being required to vote upon it. If no one even had a chance to read it, who would even have the ability to author 800+ pages in such a short time?

Logic tells us the Patriot Act was written well in advance of 9/11, and the false flag 9/11 terror attack was only the excuse to push the already-written Patriot Act upon us.

I don’t like this method of forcing us to surrender our liberties to government officials writing legislation like the Patriot Act behind closed doors.

By our apathy and ignorance to what goes on behind closed doors in Washington, we now have let them get away with eliminating other Constitutionally guaranteed liberties like habeus corpus, privacy, torture, etc, etc.

#1 Kelly Winterton | December 5th, 2006 11:32 PM