- CHICAGO - In an America that
guards its civil liberties, police can't just shut down cities, make mass
arrests and quarantine thousands of people. Or can they?
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- Current and former federal officials said Friday that
if there is a terrorist attack with biological weapons, private rights
would quickly be swamped by the need to protect the public. State borders
could close, vaccines could be rationed or commandeered, the Army could
even take over cities within weeks of a deadly attack, an American Bar
Association panel predicted.
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- "To an extent, people are going to do what needs
to be done and worry about the legal niceties later," said Suzanne
Spaulding, a former top lawyer for the CIA and the Senate Intelligence
Committee.
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- The ABA panel, part of the annual meeting of the 400,000-lawyer
organization, played out an imaginary terrorist campaign to infect Americans
with the plague - from the first tips by an FBI informant in New Mexico
to closure of the Minnesota borders and riots in Cincinnati.
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- Along the way came word that a rogue Russian scientist
and the Iraqi military were involved. Eventually, the FBI, CIA, National
Centers for Disease Control, the White House, Pentagon and governors of
several states were also involved - each with broader power than many people
probably know they have, participants said.
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- Under the hypothetical scenario, law enforcement could
do little when a would-be terrorist shows up at a Santa Fe emergency room
with a case of the plague. The investigation intensified, and the FBI got
much broader authority, when several people died of the plague after attending
a concert in Minneapolis.
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- Political pressure intensified, with a demand from 20
senators of the opposite political party from the president that the White
House declare a national state of emergency. Then came word that the terrorists
planned another attack during a street festival in Cincinnati.
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- Under this scenario, the FBI could go to a special court
for permission to investigate foreigners, but could not begin stopping
everyone in downtown Cincinnati who resembles a tipster's description of
a suspected terrorist, said Eugene Bowman, deputy general counsel for the
FBI.
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- Nor could the FBI order the downtown area cordoned off
and every building searched, Bowman said. Agents would need warrants based
on better specifics than those offered in the hypothetical terrorist attack.
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- But local police could do what the FBI cannot, so long
as it was based on the need to protect public health, said Terry O'Brien,
legal consultant to a national notification network tracking infections
diseases.
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- "The idea is to prevent the epidemic," not
to catch and punish a wrongdoer, O'Brien said.
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- The president could declare martial law and federalize
state National Guards, said Michael Wermuth, head of a group advising the
government on how well it is preparing for nuclear, chemical or biological
terrorism.
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- The attorney general and the defense secretary could
also invoke a federal law that lets them call in soldiers to keep order
if police or other law enforcement cannot, Wermuth said.
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- "The military can be engaged directly in arrests,
search and seizure and intelligence collection for law enforcement purposes,"
Wermuth said. "There's very raw authority to use the military to do
any number of things that (look) like law enforcement, or to assist public
health authorities by (enforcing) quarantines."
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- The government would also have the legal power to force
people to be immunized, although as a practical matter it is probably impossible,
O'Brien said. "What are you going to do, go into somebody's home and
tie them up?"
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- On the other hand, the government could take control
of vaccine supplies, even if it meant overriding state governors bent on
hoarding their in-state stockpiles, the panelists said.
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- The hypothetical exercise ended short of the president
declaring nationwide martial law, and without the arrest or trial of the
terrorists.
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- http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,31376,00.html
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