FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE July 26, 1989 APPEAL FILED IN TEENAGER v. FBI CASE Attorneys for Todd Patterson today filed a brief in the United States Court of Appeals in Philadelphia urging the appeals court to reinstate the claims of the North Haledon teenager against the Federal Bureau of Investigation for tampering with his mail to foreign governments. The case was dismissed in February by United States District Judge Alfred Wolin after he had reviewed secret FBI documents which he said satisfied him that the FBI had not violated the teenager's rights by monitoring his communications and establishing name-indexed files in Newark, New York, and Washington. The appeals brief, filed on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union by Professor Frank Askin and the Rutgers Law School Constitutional Litigation Clinic, objected strenuously to the use of secret evidence to decide the case. After quoting from Franz Kafka's classic novel of bureaucratic tyranny, "The Trial," the brief asserted: "Such Kafkaesque adjudication has no place in our adversarial system of justice which guarantees due process of law." The appeals brief challenges the constitutional authority of government agencies both to routinely intercept Americans' mail to foreign governments and to maintain permanent records on such correspondents once they are determined to be innocent information seekers. Todd began his international correspondence as a precocious 11-year old in order to prepare his own personal world encyclopedia. Soon thereafter an FBI agent visited the house. When he inquired about the possible existence of a permanent file at the age of 15, Todd was informed by the FBI that his records were classified for reasons of national security. Todd's primary claim arises under the federal Privacy Act, which proscribes government monitoring of citizen activity protected by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. The appeals brief summarizes Todd's claims as folows: "The Privacy Act, adopted in the post-Watergate era, implements the spirit of the First Amendment and judicial decisions restricting governmental investigations of protected speech and expression by forbidding federal agencies, including the FBI, from either colecting or maintaining information on citizens' exercise of First Amendment rights unless clearly needed to effectuate law-enforcement needs. Section (e)(7) of the Privacy Act, which is at the heart of this litigation, was directed in large part at the practice, common in the J. Edgar Hoover era, of FBI spying on government opponents and critics and persons suspected of having unorthodox political views. "Even if the government can justify monitoring mail between United States citizens and allegedly hostile foreign governments, there is no apparent justification under the Privacy Act for maintaining name-indexed files on such correspondents once it is determined that the communications were entirely innocent. "Furthermore, the District Court assumed without any evidence that it is indeed necessary for the purpose of national security to routinely monitor such foreign correspondence despite the obvious chilling effect it has on protected communication." FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Professor Frank Askin or Lorraine E. Stanley, Esq. Rutgers Law School Elizabeth J. Miller, Esq. Constitutional Litigation Clinic ACLU-NJ (201) 648-5687 (201) 642-2086