The Tribune reports (“Daley out to seize autos in DUI cases,” Page 1, March 4) that the mayor “seeks to ease restrictions on the surveillance of possible criminal activity stemming from a consent decree in the police Red Squad case.”
What Mayor Richard Daley claims he is doing and what he actually is doing are not necessarily the same. The Red Squad consent decree does not prohibit or impede surveillance of criminal activity. If the decree did restrict criminal investigations, the city would not have co-authored it, the city would not have signed it and the city would not have waited 12 years to complain about it.
The city has expressly stated that it wishes to change the consent decree so that it can spy on individuals who might have expressed extreme political beliefs, with the Chicago Police Department defining which political beliefs are extreme. And remember, this is a police department that had subversive files on the League of Women Voters, the Catholic Interracial Council and the United Methodist Church.
The mayor’s intent is clear from the nature of the modification he seeks. Instead of further authorizing intelligence activities directed against crimes, the mayor’s proposed changes would permit police spying on lawful 1st Amendment conduct without requiring that the investigation concern crime.
