Jul 25, 2008 12:06 pm US/Eastern
Congress Looks At Md. Police Surveillance
WASHINGTON (WJZ) ―
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Federal lawmakers are looking into Maryland State Police surveillance of protest groups.
Controversy continues over Maryland State Police infiltrating and spying on various groups in Maryland, including anti-death penalty organizations.
Weijia Jiang reports Baltimore peace activists are drawing national attention now that members of Congress want to find out if their protests and meetings were spied on using federal dollars.
"The last thing we need is for tax dollars to be used on infiltration of innocent groups simply trying to exercise their rights," said Md. Congressman Elijah Cummings.
The American Civil Liberties Union received the paperwork that documents Maryland State Police monitoring Baltimore activists during 2005 and 2006.
In the documents obtained by the ACLU, a few names of Marylanders are listed on a terrorist database. But now that there is a call for congressional hearings, the feeling is that there will be others across the country who are also on that list.
"We're hoping to use this as a teaching moment where other cities, other states can start investigating to see if there's been surveillance on their own groups. I cannot believe Maryland was the only state doing this," said Baltimore activist Max Obuszewski.
State police say they did nothing illegal. Former governor Robert Ehrlich says if intelligence gathering wasn't going on and something happened, there would be an issue.
"And then you're going to go to me or the governor or the sergeant of state police and say, 'why weren't you doing your job? Weren't you supposed to have intelligence operations out there,'" said Ehrlich.
"We have an equal, if not greater responsibility of protecting people's rights," said Cummings.
One group is ready to present how violated they feel.
"We'll be down there whenever these hearings are held," said Obuszewski.
A state police spokesman declined to comment on the possible congressional investigation.
Congressman Cummings says he also asked Governor O'Malley to look into the situation.
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