Letter: ‘Several civil lawsuits in the pipeline brought by individuals whose civil rights were violated by the federal government’

Yacolt resident Thomas Schenk offers his thoughts on a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives regarding re-authorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in this letter to the editor are those of the author alone and do not reflect the editorial position of ClarkCountyToday.com

Among the multitude of work being addressed by the House of Representatives in D.C., is a bill regarding re-authorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

At this time it is on hold … and that’s a good thing.

Abuses by FBI agents and their upper management in submitting false, incomplete and unverified information in sworn affidavits supporting FISA surveillance requests monitoring innocent Americans require another Church Commission to once and for all preclude the ability of out-of-control government entities from violating citizen’s civil rights.

One has to wonder why the FISA Court judges in D.C. didn’t take steps to hold some of these individuals in contempt of court … it’s only been several years or so since being exposed!

Since the truth of these unwarranted FISA applications and the supporting questionable affidavits were revealed, as far as I am aware, not one individual has been reprimanded or held accountable by the FISA Court for these abuses. Was the “fix” in?

There are, I believe, several civil lawsuits in the pipeline brought by individuals whose civil rights were violated by the Federal government. Civil lawsuits are not swift justice for those whose lives were impacted by the government’s unlawful practices and the lengthy time achieving a resolution in those cases is certainly no deterrent in precluding similar situations in the future.

Adding to this “fog” of what actually happened is the pseudo journalists who never met a government violation they couldn’t justify.

Subsequently, Americans are left in limbo while the government hides, when crimes are committed, the violations which take real journalists years to uncover, and when the violations are finally exposed it is really a day late and a dollar short.

Thomas Schenk
Yacolt