On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 05:44:03PM -0500, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote:

How can it possibly be treason if there was no declaration of war?

If you give "aid" to the "enemies" of the U.S., that would qualify as treason even absent a declaration of war, in my opinion. Note I'm obviously not saying what Hawash (allegedly) did would qualify as such, and let's remember the DOJ did not file that charge. "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court." -Declan

My reading is the opposite. That's why there's an "or" instead of an "and" there. --Declan At 11:35 PM 4/29/2003 -0500, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote:

"Enemies" are discussed in juxtaposition to "levying War against [the United States]". This implies that "Enemies" of the United States are those with whom the U.S. is at war. Since the Constitution gives Congress the sole power to declare war, I conclude that "Enemies" in this context can only be those entities on whom Congress has declared war.

At 07:00 PM 4/30/2003 -0500, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote:

Have you ever heard the phrase, "unconstitutionally vague"? If "enemies" are something other than parties with whom the U.S. is at war, then who are they?

Style tip: the phrase "unconstitutionally vague" is typically used to refer to laws that violate various sections of the Constitution, not sections of the actual Constitution. It would be hard for the Constitution to violate itself. :) -Declan

I read the compliant. It is only 43 pages. Here's what I gathered. It was a quick read, and I fully expect and welcome comments, corrections, and opinions. Of course mixed between these claims is a bunch of stuff about the activities of the "Portland Six", but other than the few assertions below, there is no direct evidence that Hawash committed any of the acts that the "Portland Six" did. Hawash - bought a parka and a backpack at REI. (ooooh, ominous). Hawash filed a quit claim transferring his house into his wife's name. (My dad, a consulting civil engineer, had the deed of our house put solely in my mother's name to protect against losing the house in a liability suit. Hawash could have done it just because he was leaving the country and didn't want any issues in case of airplane accident, kidnapping, etc.) Hawash had his wife open a bank account in her name only and transferred $5K to it. ($5K ?, Later they document that Hawash made around $320K in 2001, and $180K in 2002. Yeah, she could start a new life on that.) Hawash flew to China and returned to the US on exactly the same dates as the other guys. Hawash appears to have stayed in the same building as the other guys. His and the other guy's lodging was in the same building, but different hotels, and the hotel that Hawash had reservations to stay at doesn't have a record of him being there. (Okay, even this does look suspicious to me, but it's definitely seems a little less than "beyond a reasonable doubt".) An "source" claims he/she "thought" he saw someone "maybe" fitting hawash's description "maybe" talking with the other guys at the hotel in China. In searchs of the other guys houses, they found that one of the other guys had a business card with Hawash's phone number on it. Some of the other guys had Hawash's phone number also. One guy mowed Hawash's lawn. Hawash wrote a check for $105 to the guy that mowed Hawash's lawn. The all attended the same Mosque in CA. "Neighbors" reported to the FBI that Hawash became withdrawn after the September 11th attacks, changed his clothing style (From "Western" to "Eastern"), grew a beard, and starting attending the mosque more regularly. (Gee, I saw a lot of press reports about an upsurge of people in the US taking their religious convictions more seriously and attending church more regularly after the Sept 11th attacks, are they potential terrorists too ?). Hawash told others that he was going to China to pursue clients for his software consulting practice. However, his home phone and cell-phone records show he made no phone calls to China in advance of his trip. (Hmmm, "negative evidence", that's a good one. Hellooooo, ever heard of e-mail, snail-mail, or communication via intermediaries ?) Therefore, he MUST be guilty of conspiracy. Even the LE admits that they showed some pictures to one their "sources", and He/She didn't recognize Hawash's picture as being one of the "other guys". Be afraid. VERY afraid. -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request.

Declan McCullagh wrote:

...

"No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court."

Kevin S. Van Horn wrote:

This also precludes conviction of Hawash, as there was no overt act, only a claim that his intentions in travelling were to later commit such an act.

The actual charge against Hawash is _conspiracy_ to 1) levy war against the U.S., 2) provide material support to designated terrorist organizations (Al-Qaida), and 3) contribute services to Al-Qaida and the Taliban. The "levy war" statute is titled "Seditious Conspiracy" (18 USCA ? 2384) and states that: "[i]f two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both." There is a general conspiracy statute (18 USC 371), on which charges (2) and (3) are based, which states that when "two or more persons conspire ... to commit any offense against the United States, ... in any manner or for any purpose, and one or more of such persons do any act to effect the object of the conspiracy" those person are punishable under the statute. Conspiracy is the closest thing we have to a thought-crime in the U.S. and it is used quite a bit by the feds. The only things that saves it from being a pure thought crime is that a conspiracy must be an actual agreement between two or more people to commit a crime (or fraud), and that an affirmative action must be taken in furtherance of the crime (in some drug-related offenses, this isn't even needed). The "act" to effect the object of the conspiracy does _not_ itself have to be illegal. The gov't can argue that merely going to China (getting closer to Afghanistan) or the alleged "weapons training," were acts in furtherance of the conspiracy. These charges are obviously B.S. From what I have read (including the indictments against the Portland six) the main gov't "informant" was really a provocator, and the evidence against all of them is pretty thin. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the gov't gets a conviction. They might resort to threatening the suspects with "enemy combatant" status to force a plea, like they did to the suspects in Buffalo. It will be interesting to see how far the feds push the "enemy combatant" strategy to see if the courts can or will do anything about it. Since the courts have been handing out material witness warrants left and right allowing for indefinite detention, things look pretty bad. The hype about a "terrorist cell" is ridiculous fodder for the media. Assuming Hawash and the Portland Six were really doing what the feds allege, they certainly aren't terrorists. If they were they wouldn't have bothered trying to get half way around the world to kill americans. -Andy Lopata

...

Furthermore, since when is mere travel treason? If you could show that he had actually participated in war against the U.S. -- not just thought about it, not just taken leg one of a trip that could eventually get him to a location where he would have an opportunity to do so (if he didn't change his mind first) -- then there could be a case.

It's fun to imagine this in the context of a normal crime.... Prosecutor: "We will show that the defendant was seen in the company of some people who were believed to have been planning to consider going over to South Central, where they might have joined up with the Crips and eventually tried to shoot at some police officers. As it turned out, they didn't make it to South Central (they got lost), and if they had, the Crips would probably have robbed them and sent them scurrying home, but it's clear that these people would have been up to no good, if only they'd been competent enough to manage it. As evidence, we submit this copy of the Autobiography of Malcolm X, and these five rap CDs, found in a midnight raid on his house. We're requesting the death penalty." --John Kelsey, kelsey.j@ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259

What trail? You think "Mike" will ever see the light of day? If there's going to be a trial it will be in secret - by a kangaroo shadow court, and it will be classified. If he's found innocent, then he'll probably be thrown in jail as he was exposed to classified information which we couldn't allow to leak out. So he'll be a guest of Uncle Sam, oh, excuse me, the Shadow Uncle Sam, for a long time. On the other hand, if they do cave in and let him go, they'll have to admit that they were wrong, and that would set precendence for future such releases, and the whole disappearing program will be at risk, so they'll have to stick to their guns and hang on to him. It is not enough to fear Big Brother, you must learn to love him. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_@_sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Wed, 30 Apr 2003, Tim May wrote:

On Wednesday, April 30, 2003, at 06:49 AM, John Kelsey wrote:

...

Prosecutor: "We will show that the defendant was seen in the company of some people who were believed to have been planning to consider going over to South Central, where they might have joined up with the

<SNIP>

And several months later:

"We are prosecuting the defense attorney for the man convicted last month of thinking about planning to possibly travel to South Central to try to join a gang. His crime was that he whispered to his clients during meetings in the jail, preventing us from tape-recording what they they said. Inasmuch as his client was convicted as part of the War on Some Drugs and has been transferred to our military prison in Guantanamo Bay, we are charging this attorney as an "illegal combatant" in this War on Some Drugs."