Carla Spartos reports on the new Anti-Rave Act Party Patrol in the Village Voice.

Guaranteed to spoil your summer concert-going experience and passed without congressional hearings, the bill, officially known as the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act of 2003, which is expected to be signed into law by Bush within weeks, is

equipped with a loosely worded law making venue owners and concert promoters responsible for their patrons' partying ways, overzealous prosecutors could target mainstream event organizers with stiff fines, jail sentences (up to 20 years), and property seizures.

Who to thank for the bill? Democratic Senator Joe Biden, who is also responsible for the 80's Crack House Statute, and the Office of National Drug Control Policy. While the Government claims the law is not about "incidental drug use," we have our doubts. And here's a truism if ever there was one, from NYC promoter Matt E. Silver:

The bottom line is if the federal government wants to get you, they will."

Dumb law of the week: In Souderton, PA, outside Philadelphia:

Borough officials are considering an ordinance that would make it illegal for groups of people to gather anywhere from public sidewalks to parks, with the threat of jail time for loiterers -- and, in the case of juvenile repeat offenders, their parents.

Local leaders say the loitering ordinance is needed to address what they say is a growing incidence of vandalism and other misbehavior.

But the proposal has raised the ire of civil libertarians, not to mention local teenagers who say this community of 6,700 outside Philadelphia is trying to make "hanging out" a crime.

"What are we supposed to do, just sit in our houses?" asked Becca Murphy, 13, who was hanging out with a half-dozen friends after school Tuesday in Souderton Community Park on Main Street. "There's no problems here, there's no gangs or anything at all. It's totally ridiculous."

Two lawyers in Washington, DC have filed suit against the city in Superior Court to return all fines paid by persons who received a ticket via a camera photo.

The two litigators are seeking to represent the entire "class of automobile owners" ticketed since the red-light camera program began July 31, 1999, and since the photo-radar program started Aug. 6, 2001. "There is no proof that the owner is driving the car and the only way to get out of the ticket is to submit an affidavit identifying the person who was driving your car," Mr. Ruffin said.

Judges in other jurisdictions, such as Denver and San Diego have invalidated the camera programs. A lot of money is at stake in D.C.

The District has collected $26,451,367 from radar cameras since the program began through last month, according the data available on the Metropolitan Police Department's Web site (www.mpdc.dc.gov). The city has mailed out 510,667 citations, and 356,315 motorists have paid the fines. The red-light cameras have generated $20,983,495 for the city in nearly five years of enforcement, with 242,748 motorists having paid the fines out of 361,464 tickets issued.

Update: Kirk Parker notes in the comments section that the conservative Weekly Standard has a five part series on what's wrong with the DC red light cameras:

Red-light cameras are all over Washington--and coming to a city near you. The science behind them is bad and the police are using them to make money, not save lives. It's much worse than you thought."

From Ashcroft's New Ally by Chisum Lee in the Village Voice:

John Ascroft has a most unlikely ally in Charles Schumer, Democratic Senator from New York. The senator wants to give federal investigators wider latitude under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows the most intrusive surveillance of suspected foreign spies and terrorists, and of individuals who may not be provably suspect themselves but can be linked to a suspect "foreign power" that currently may be as loosely defined as one other person. Schumer wants to redefine "foreign power" to mean the desired surveillance target alone, warning that someone could plot terrorism with no connection to anyone else. This change would obviate the need to make a link, removing one step from investigators' efforts to justify a FISA probe. In an indication of how seriously this change could jeopardize individual rights, the Kyl-Schumer bill would not apply to U.S. citizens or immigrants who are legal residents. Schumer conceded that there could be U.S. citizens who are single-handedly plotting terrorism and whom investigators might not nab without a FISA-like surveillance tool. But that risk cannot be helped, he said last week, as "every citizen has traditionally had greater rights than noncitizens."

Here is another article on the topic.

Update: Via Atrios we learn that Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner, architect of the Amber Alert Bill, is resisting attempts to expand the Patriot Act --and eliminate the Sunset Provisions--he says the Administration has not been forthcoming enough about use of the Act to date. As Atrios says, "Give his office a call at (202) 225-5101 and let him know he's doing the right thing, particularly if he's you Rep."

The New York Times weighs in on the folly of Congress' passage of the Feeney Amendment to the Amber Alert bill:

Just when we should be reducing unfairness in the nation's criminal justice system, Congress is moving in the opposite direction. Last week, lawmakers approved provisions that will prevent federal judges from using their discretion to give prison terms that are shorter than those prescribed by federal sentencing guidelines. The changes were tagged on to the Amber Alert bill that creates a national notification system for child abductions. The amendment will further confine the already sharply limited choices federal judges now have in sentencing.... Chief Justice William Rehnquist, hardly a coddler of criminals, warned members of Congress that limiting judicial sentencing power along these lines "would seriously impair the ability of courts to impose just and responsible sentences." But egged on by the Bush Justice Department, legislators refused to heed that advice, or even hold hearings. Under the guise of protecting children, Congress has badly undermined fairness and judicial independence. It has also upset the balance between uniform sentencing and individualized punishment that the system of sentencing guidelines was supposed to deliver.

The Washington Post Sunday had an editorial aptly titled, Nation Behind Bars.

Via Instapundit:

JOE BIDEN'S DUMB ANTI-RAVE BILL has passed both houses of Congress. Biden -- and everyone else involved with this lousy piece of legislation -- should be doubly ashamed: first for being associated with such a crappy bill, and second for sneaking it through without hearings and attaching it to an unrelated piece of feelgood legislation.

It is truly a lousy bill, and we are all the more dismayed that a Democrat, Senator Joe Biden, is behind it. And that in the Senate, the bill passed 98 - 0.

Why did this bill pass without hearings? Because our congresspersons and senators are scared to death of being perceived as soft on crime. They wanted to get the amber alert bill passed and were going to put up with any rag tag legislation that got tacked on to do it. Sensenbrenner has been the key driving force in the House behind the Amber alert bill.

As DNC says,

Save the Children, Screw the Rest of Us: RAVE Act, Measure to Limit Judicial Sentencing Discretion Pass House and Senate

Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) and Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) took advantage of Congress' engrained inability to vote against anything that might "save the children" to win passage of two measures destined to cause pain and misery for untold numbers of adult partygoers, club owners, event organizers and criminal defendants. Biden, an inveterate drug warrior who authored the notorious "crack house" legislation of 1984, hitched his widely criticized RAVE Act (S226, now known officially as the "Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act," Biden having dropped the inflammatory moniker after running into unexpected opposition last year) to the popular Amber Alert bill (S151/HR1104), which sets up a national system of alerts for kidnapped kids and increases child pornography penalties, while Feeney used the bill to pass a measure to limit the ability of federal judges to grant downward departures in sentences -- a measure not limited to sex crimes against children and much more likely to be used to prevent federal judges from lightening sentences for drug offenders.

....Under Biden's RAVE Act, anyone who organizes an event or owns a venue where someone uses an illegal drug can be held liable for that drug use. Although expressly crafted and advanced as an attack on the rave culture, the bill's implications are frighteningly broad. It could be used against promoters of hemp fests, rock concert promoters or even -- in theory -- against professional sports franchises if fans are smoking joints in the stands.

Drug Policy Alliance will have more shortly on the details of the Rave Act. We're on the road this weekend --San Antonio for an ABA Criminal Justice Section Council Meeting and to lecture on the problems with eyewitness identification testimony--the hotel, while charming, has a 28.8 connection in the rooms. We just got hotel security to open up the business office with a high speed connection so we could read the over 200 emails and comments TalkLeft got today and do some last-minute Lexis research for our talk tomorrow.

The new legislation will be a hot topic at tomorrow's meeting here, with some very knowledgeable legislative experts advising us what really happened and what it all means. We'll report here after the meeting. We're particularly looking forward to hearing what Ron Weich has to say.

In the meantime, read the great sites on the right. We probably won't be able to update the newsfeed on the left until Sunday.

From Kyle O'Dowd, Legislative Director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers:

The Amber Alert Bill, with its provisions restricting downward departures in sentencing passed the House and the Senate today. The House vote was 400-yea, 25-nay, 2-present, 8-not voting. You can see how individual House members voted here. For more information on the sentencing aspects of the bill, go here. The Senate vote was 98-0. Senators Kennedy, Leahy and Durbin all sharply criticized the last-minute add-on in floor speeches -- but, in the end, not a single Senator was willing to vote against the Child Abduction Prevention Act.

Here are some of the better comments we've found.

Virginia Democrat Bobby Scott, a leading critic of the bill, said it is "loaded down with an array of crime sound bite provisions that make the AMBER Alert an afterthought." He said "egregious" criminal justice provisions might be good politics but it was bad policy and bad law.

Chief Justice William Rehnquist weighed in by letter:

Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota quoted a letter Thursday from Supreme Court chief Justice William Rehnquist saying that sentencing language could do "serious harm."

Perhaps the best statement came from Congressman and former prosecutor Bill Delahunt (D-MA), which Kyle O'Dowd forwarded to us. If you have a few moments, we encourage you to read it--we've reprinted it below:

U.S. Rep. Sam Farr is introducing a bill Thursday to legalize medical need as a valid defense in federal prosecutions.

The bill's co-sponsors are two congressmen rarely found on the same side of an issue -- Massachusetts liberal Democrat Barney Frank and Huntington Beach conservative Republican Dana Rohrabacher.

The bill by Farr, a Carmel Democrat, applies only to federal trials in states that have passed laws allowing the distribution and use of marijuana, under a doctor's prescription, for medical use.

Frank also is backing a similar bill that would simply allow state law to trump federal law.

There will be a press conference on the Hill tomorrow. We welcome these Congressmens' efforts to fight Ashcroft and his blind, cruel and inhumane crusade to keep terminally ill and other medically suffering patients from obtaining relief for their chronic pain.

Update: We just received this note of caution about the bill from Keith Stroup, Executive Director of NORML:

Librarians are making noise over the Patriot Act :

Every public computer inside this city's library has a new warning taped to its screen. Beware, the message says, anything you read is now subject to secret scrutiny by federal agents.

"We felt strongly that this had to be done," said librarian Linda Wilson. "The government has never had this kind of power before. It feels like Big Brother."

Across the country, in a movement that belies their staid image, librarians are rising up in anger and rallying against a law the Justice Department calls one of its most important new tools to help catch terrorists before they strike.

....Earlier this year, the American Library Association, which has 64,000 members, formally denounced the Patriot Act provision and passed a resolution urging Congress to repeal it. Since then, about two dozen state library groups -- from California to Georgia -- have taken the same stand. And that is only the beginning of the backlash.

Some libraries are taking more drastic action, like destroying records of what their visitors read--and their sign-up logs for computer time.

"This law is dangerous," said Emily Sheketoff, executive director of the ALA's Washington office. "I read murder mysteries -- does that make me a murderer? I read spy stories -- does that mean I'm a spy? There's no clear link between a person's intellectual pursuits and their actions."

We just gained a whole lot of new respect for librarians. Let's hope all businesses catch on and take similar action. This law applies to all business records--from Barnes and Noble to Laptop Lanes and everything in between.

Yesterday, Tuesday, April 8, 2003, a Senate and House Conference Committee, without a hearing, public notice or a debate in Congress, attached the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act (formerly known as the RAVE Act) to the Amber Alert Bill (a child abduction bill). As Drug Policy Alliance comments, "This is “backdoor” policy-making at its worst and in no way upholds the democratic principles rooted in our legislative process." Take action in three easy steps here.

Congress will also vote on the Hatch-Sensenbrenner amendment to the Feeney Amendment to the Amber Alert Child Protection bill. This bill puts in effect puts sentencings in the hands of prosecutors while tying the hands of federal judges. Go here to act now.

Rep. Feeney is feeling proud of himself. The welcome page of his Web site includes a recent Washington Post editorial, with the following prefatory remarks:

"On April 4, 2003 the soft on crime editorial board of the Washington Post commented on Congressman Tom Feeney's Amendment to the Child Abduction Prevention Act. The amendment that was overwhelmingly passed by the House of Representatives, by a vote of 357 to 58, on March 27th was also opposed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Criminal Defense Lawyers."

For those who are interested, on his Web site, , Rep. Tom Feeney offers C-SPAN coverage of his March 27 introduction of the "Feeney Amendment." (under recent floor speeches section) (requires Real Player). Thanks to Peter Parker of Boston, MA and Todd Bussert of CT for flagging this.

It's not law yet. The full house and senate have to vote on it. For what can still be done to oppose it, see the NACDL webpage on the bill.

This just in from Kyle O'Dowd, Legislative Director for the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers on the Hatch-Sensenbrenner Amendment on sentencing rushed through the House-Senate Conference on the Amber Alert Bill yesterday. Please note the differences between the versions.

At 1:34 this morning, Sen Hatch's staff circulated a new version of the bill.  The overnight changes improve the proposal but it remains highly objectionable. Here is a revised version of yesterday's list based on a preliminary analysis of the new text: