The following statement is from Ramona Ripston, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California:

The Pasadena Police Department today released the report of the Los Angeles Office of Independent Review examining the shooting of Leroy Barnes by two officers of the Pasadena Police Department on February 19, 2009.

The ACLU of Southern California and its Pasadena/Foothills Chapter had called for an independent review of the PPD’s own investigation of the Barnes shooting, and we believe the OIR’s final report proves the value of this additional inquiry. We applaud PPD Chief Bernard Melekian for his recognition of the importance of this review in providing both policy recommendations to the department and reassurance to the community of an outside review, and we urge Pasadena City Council to adopt it.

The report by the OIR gives the PPD positive marks in many aspects of its handling of the investigation, including, importantly, the overall effort to provide transparency to the community about the shooting and subsequent investigation. However, the OIR also identifies serious concerns about some aspects of the PPD’s conduct, including the tactics used by officers in approaching the car that Barnes was in; the use of leading questions by investigators questioning the officers involved; and the lack of attention by the department’s investigators to prior shooting incidents involving the same officers. Addressing these and other concerns raised in the OIR’s report will improve PPD tactics and also the safety of officers, suspects and members of the community.

We are gratified that Chief Melekian has said that his department accepts these recommendations, and that he will provide the City Council’s public safety committee with specific steps that the department will undertake to address them. Chief Melekian has also indicated that the department and the Pasadena city manager will recommend to the council that an analysis be conducted by the Office of Independent Review in all future officer-involved shootings resulting in injury or death. The ACLU/SC continues to likewise recommend such a policy.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – A judge in the United Arab Emirates sentenced U.S. citizen Naji Hamdan to 18 months after finding him guilty of unspecified terrorism-related charges that stem from an apparent U.S.- orchestrated arrest and a coerced confession obtained under torture.

Hamdan, who has been imprisoned in the U.A.E. for more than a year, will be released shortly based on time already served. In handing down the sentence Monday, the U.A.E. judge never specified the charges on which Hamdan was convicted.

“If the government of the U.A.E. thought that Mr. Hamdan was a threat to anyone’s security, he would not have been ordered released on time served,” said Ahilan Arulanantham, director of immigrant rights and national security at ACLU/SC.

Hamdan has become an unfortunate example of the Obama administration’s willingness to continue the Bush-era practice of using foreign governments -- often those with abysmal human rights records -- to detain and interrogate suspects based on little if any evidence while subverting the U.S. judicial process.

Last year U.A.E. state security forces, at the apparent behest of the U.S. government, detained Hamdan in a secret prison for three months, during which time officials interrogated and tortured him until he agreed to confess to whatever the officials wanted. Hamdan believes that at least one American official was present during a torture session, when the interrogator spoke to him in American English while he remained blindfolded.

It was not until the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit alleging that the U.S. government was responsible for Hamdan’s detention that he was transferred from the secret prison into a regular prison in the U.A.E. and charged with having committed unspecified terrorist offenses.

“The United States is not safer today because Naji Hamdan was imprisoned in the U.A.E.” said Jennie Pasquarella, an ACLU/SC staff attorney. “But if the Obama administration continues Bush-era policies that tolerate arbitrary detention and torture of suspects on behalf of the U.S., Mr. Hamdan’s story is destined to be repeated itself.”

Hamdan lived for two decades in the Los Angeles area, where he ran an auto-parts business and helped manage the Islamic Center of Hawthorne, a mosque and community center. His nightmare began in 2006 when he relocated his family and business to the U.A.E. As the Hamdans tried to board a flight at Los Angeles International Airport, FBI agents separated him from his wife and children, detained him and questioned him for hours. He was eventually released and allowed to travel, but when he returned to Los Angeles in early 2007 to check on his business, he was subject to further intensive FBI surveillance.

Then, in the summer of 2008, FBI agents traveled from Los Angeles to the U.A.E. to question Hamdan further. Shortly thereafter he was detained incommunicado by U.A.E. state security agents.

“I don’t understand why my father was taken away from me,” said Hamdan’s 17 year-old son Khaled Hamdan. “This is so painful. I grew up in the United States, but I feel like my government abandoned me, my family and my father.”

Since Hamdan’s arrest, both U.S. and U.A.E. officials have refused to deny that the U.S. is responsible for his detention. However, the charges against him, which included visiting Islamic websites, are for alleged “crimes” that were not committed in the U.A.E. There is no appeal to the court’s decision.

“The United States betrayed the values of justice and due process at the expense of a beloved leader, father and friend. Everything Naji’s children believed this country stood for was turned upside down and in the process they were separated from their father,” said Hossam Hemdan, the brother of Naji Hamdan who lives in Los Angeles. “We are grateful today, that Hamdan can return to his family.”

The ACLU National office annually recognizes the efforts of graduating seniors who have demonstrated a strong commitment to civil liberties throughout their high school experience. This year, 15 high school students will each be awarded a $7,000 college scholarship through the program. These scholar-activists will also be invited to participate in the Youth Activist Institute at the National ACLU office in New York City, to be held over several days in the summer of 2010. There, the scholarship recipients will learn more about the work of the ACLU and receive hands-on training on how to be grassroots activists and leaders on their campuses.

To qualify, students must:

• Have demonstrated a strong commitment to civil liberties through some form of activism
• Be a high school senior planning on entering an accredited college or university as a full-time, degree-seeking student
• Have attained a cumulative GPA of 3.0 on a 4.0 scale at the time of graduation
• Not be a current ACLU plaintiff or witness in a legal case

Application process:

• To apply for the scholarship, the student must be nominated by the affiliate, in this case, the ACLU of Southern California. Affiliates can nominate more than one student
• The first step for the affiliate is conducting a brief interview with the potential applicant to determine if he or she is a qualified candidate. If so, the affiliate sends out the application form.
• The application form includes: 1,000-word personal statement about your civil liberties activism; a recommendation form to be completed by an adult leader in your school or community that attests to your commitment as an activist and civil libertarian (this reference cannot be a family member); and an endorsement form that will be filled out by the local affiliate to formally nominate you for the scholarship. You will be required to submit your most up-to-date high school transcript to the GPA requirement.

Applicants will be judged on the following standards (in order of importance):

• The strength and depth of the candidate's contributions to civil liberties
• Demonstrated leadership
• The likelihood of the applicant continuing commitment to civil liberties in the future
• Commitment to academic excellence
• Demonstrated financial need

Winners will be announced in February 2010.

To schedule an application interview with the ACLU/SC, drop us an email. Deadline to schedule an interview: Nov. 13, 2009. Deadline to return completed applications to the ACLU/SC: Nov. 27, 2009.

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