US DA of DC & DC police subpoenaed Facebook for account data on numerous inauguration protesters

[bigtree]

Link to tweet

On Wednesday, one of the individuals who was arrested at protests over the inauguration of Donald Trump received an email from Facebook’s “Law Enforcement Response Team.” (CityLab obtained the email from the individual’s attorney on the condition of anonymity for both the client and their representative.)



More than 230 protesters had been arrested that day, and many—including the individual who’d received this email—were charged with rioting and had their phones seized by Washington, D.C., police. The police have been holding Inauguration protesters’ phones since the arrests.

Did D.C. police ask Facebook to reveal information about this arrestee? In an emailed response to CityLab’s request for more information, Rachel Reid, a spokesperson for the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, responded that “MPD does not comment on investigative tactics.” The District of Columbia United States Attorney's Office—the agency leading the prosecution of Inauguration protesters—has not yet responded to CityLab’s inquiry...

D.C. police have been heavily criticized by civil liberties groups for the inauguration arrests, particularly those of lawyers and journalists. The broad nature of the arrests prompted an immediate class action lawsuit. Concerns have also been raised about the police’s decision to hold the phones of all those arrested. As CityLab reported last week, one arrestee’s Gmail account showed account activity from their mobile device, which was in police possession. This prompted questions about whether the police had the phones out, instead of properly securing them away in evidence bags, causing concerns that police were mining them for content pre-trial.


read more: http://www.citylab.com/crime/2017/02/inauguration-protesters-targeted-for-facebook-searches/515517/

[exboyfil]

1. They are preparing the wire cages in Room 101

Paging Winston Smith.

[KittyWampus]

2. Seems like there was a lot of misconduct going on and I hope there are some good lawyers

involved helping those caught in this.

[Danascot]

3. Not a lawyer but

isn't this an illegal search unless they had warrants? I assume the ACLU is on it?

[KittyWampus]

4. Hope to hear more about this.