A Colorado lawyer stopped by local police in three states because his name appears on a federal terrorist watch list is challenging the government’s ability to detain him.
A lawsuit filed by Francisco “Kiko” Martinez on Thursday in U.S. District Court in Santa Fe alleges federal and state officials violated his constitutional rights during traffic stops.
First in Colorado, then in Illinois and New Mexico, police stopped Martinez on traffic violations and held him without a warrant for hours, in one case handcuffing him and placing him in a locked police car, while they checked his status with federal counter-terrorism officials, the lawsuit alleges.
“We’re challenging their ability to subject him to de facto arrests. They’re not just tracking him,” attorney Richard Rosenstock of Santa Fe said after filing the 17-page complaint, which was assigned to federal District Judge John Conway.
“What if his turning signal stops working? He could be held for hours. … How many times do they get to stop him?”
The lawsuit names FBI Director Robert Mueller and local police and seeks unspecified compensation and punitive damages.
Martinez, 60, said he is reluctant to drive, especially with his grandchildren, let alone fly, for fear of detention by police.
“I believe this illegal government conduct represents an even greater loss of freedom than the warrantless telephone surveillance we have all heard about,” said Martinez, a civil rights attorney who lives in Alamosa.
He and his attorneys contend that he wrongfully was placed on a federal Violent Gang and Terrorist Organization list after he was charged with sending letter bombs in 1973.
Back then, a warrant for his arrest prompted him to flee the country. Border guards caught him in 1980 trying to re-enter from Mexico. Courts cleared him of all charges.
Now Martinez’s name apparently remains in a federal terrorist- screening database available to police nationwide. President Bush in 2003 ordered creation of this system, which consolidates watch lists maintained by several branches of government.
Police increasingly check names of people they stop against this rapidly expanding computerized system.
FBI lawyers last year declared terrorist-screening records exempt from the Privacy Act, which lets Americans review their records and correct wrong information, determine who has records and limits records to relevant information.
FBI officials say the watch-list system is a crucial tool against terrorism.
Information used to place people on the watch list system “has been vetted,” FBI spokeswoman Monique Kelso said, declining to comment on the Martinez case.
The system’s protocol, she said, “does not permit local law enforcement to hold people indefinitely.”
Staff writer Bruce Finley can be reached at 303-820-1700 or bfinley@denverpost.com.
