Immediate delivery
In addition, I introduced amendments that now require law enforcement agents to deliver the person of any terror suspect to judicial authorities immediately upon arrest before they are brought anywhere for interrogation or further detention.
The judicial authority need not have jurisdiction over the case for which the suspect had been arrested or over the place where the terrorist act might have been committed. All that is required is that the judicial authority holds office or resides nearest the place where the arrest took place.
III. Under Section 27, the bank accounts or financial papers of terror suspects may be examined. At first blush, perception may be created that the section unduly intrudes into the sacrosanct sphere of privacy.
In fairness, note that there is the requirement of judicial authorization, and, again, the basis is probable cause.
IV. Under Section 39, the law enforcement agents may seize, sequester and freeze the bank deposits, financial assets and properties of whatever nature of a person suspected of or charged with terror crimes. Read in isolation, the Section poses a threat to the Constitutional right of people to own property.
By itself, the section trumps, at least, three of a persons fundamental rights in the Constitution:
1. The right not to be deprived even momentarily, I would like to add – of property without due process of law (Article III, Section 1);
2. The right to the equal protection of the law (Article III, Section 1). Unlike suspected terror organizations whose properties may also be seized or sequestered but only after a court hearing (Section 17, HSA), there is no such trial requirement for a suspected individual terrorist; and
3. The right to be presumed innocent until the contrary is proved (Article III, Section 14, paragraph 2).
Under Section 39, the seizure, sequestration or freezing may be done at the stage where the person is merely suspected of or charged with but not yet convicted of terrorist crimes.
2007 Elections, Terrorism
