The ACLU of Southern California, the Council for American-Islamic Relations of Greater Los Angeles, and the law firm Hadsell Stormer Keeny Richardson & Renick LLP today announced they have filed a federal class action law suit against the Federal Bureau of Investigations for infiltrating mainstream mosques in Southern California and targeting Muslim Americans for surveillance solely because of their religion.

For over 14 months between 2006 and 2007, FBI agents planted an informant in the Orange County mosques who posed as a convert to Islam and through whom the FBI collected names, telephone numbers, e-mails, and other information on hundreds of individuals, including Sheikh Yassir Fazaga, Ali Malik, and Yassir Abdel Rahim, plaintiffs in the case and three of the many people who interacted with the FBI’s informant.

The FBI directed the informant, Craig Monteilh, to gather as much information as possible on members of the Muslim community, and to focus on people who were more devout in their religious practice irrespective of whether any particular individual was believed to be involved in criminal activity.

“The FBI gathered information on hundreds of innocent Americans simply because they worship at a mosque. It’s hard to imagine a more blatant violation of the First Amendment’s guarantees against religious discrimination,” said Peter Bibring, staff attorney for the ACLU of Southern California.

The First Amendment guarantees that no person should be singled out for different treatment by the government because of his or her religion, which is exactly what the FBI did to the Muslim community in Orange County. There are approximately 120,000 Muslims in Orange County, making the area home to the second largest population of Muslims in the United States.

“Targeting Muslims for surveillance not only destroys community cohesion, it erodes the trust between law enforcement and Muslim communities, which undermines national security,” said Ameena Mirza Qazi, deputy executive director and staff attorney for CAIR-LA.

Montheilh’s role as an FBI informant was not revealed until February 2009, first in court documents where the FBI and local law enforcement revealed his role, and then through his own statements which have been reported widely in the press.

“This practice is an abuse of the Constitution, and this case will force the FBI to destroy its illegally obtained information,” said Josh Piovia-Scott, an attorney with the law firm Hadsell Stormer Keeny Richardson & Renick LLP.

The lawsuit seeks injunctive relief on behalf of all people targeted by the FBI agents and their informant, requiring the FBI to turn over or destroy all information collected through the discriminatory investigation, as well as damages for emotional distress for the three named plaintiffs.

Top photo: Ameena Mirza Qazi, deputy executive director and staff attorney, CAIR-LA, with Imam Yassir Fazaga (left), and Hussam Ayloush, executive director, CAIR-LA.

Bottom photo: Dan Stormer, attorney, of Hadsell Stormer Keeny Richardson & Renick LLP.

By Jerry Markon Washington Post Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/22/AR201102...
An FBI informant who infiltrated a California mosque violated the constitutional rights of hundreds of Muslims by targeting them for surveillance because of their religion, the ACLU and a Muslim group said in a lawsuit Tuesday.
The lawsuit, filed against the FBI and seven of its agents and supervisors, focuses on the actions several years ago of Craig Monteilh, a paid FBI informant. Monteilh has said he was instructed to spy on worshipers at an Irvine mosque in a quest for potential terrorists, allegations that prompted fierce criticism of the FBI from some Muslims in Southern California and nationwide.
The lawsuit alleges that Monteilh was ordered by his FBI handlers to conduct "indiscriminate surveillance" of Muslims, violating their First Amendment right to freedom of religion. Filed on behalf of three Muslim plaintiffs, the 64-page document seeks class action status, unspecified damages and a court order instructing the FBI to destroy or return the information Monteilh collected.
"The FBI should be spending its time and resources investigating actual threats, not spying on every American who happens to worship at a mosque,'' said Peter Bibring, a staff attorney for the ACLU of Southern California, which filed the complaint along with the Los Angeles office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
FBI officials declined to comment on the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, but empasized that they are careful not to violate civil liberties when they use informants and do not target anyone based on religion or ethnicity.
The lawsuit comes after years of national debate over how the FBI can stop terrorism while preserving civil liberties. The FBI says it has been successful in striking that balance.
FBI and Justice Department officials say that they have gone to great lengths to maintain good relations with Muslims and that the Monteilh case is not representative of those efforts. Some Muslims say the revelations about Monteilh have seriously damaged their relationship with the FBI.
Monteilh, who had served time in jail after being convicted of forgery, revealed his informant status in 2009, and law enforcement sources have confirmed that he was a paid FBI informant for several years until 2007. They have said he aided an existing investigation and was not told to target Muslims because of their religion.
Legal experts said that point - whether the ACLU can prove that the FBI randomly targeted Muslims - will be key in determining the case's outcome. If the FBI did, "the case has a strong likelihood of success,'' said David Cole, a constitutional law and national security expert at Georgetown University's law school.
John Baker, a professor at Louisiana State University's law school and a former state prosecutor, said the ACLU's case is heavily dependent on Monteilh's word. "Using informants is an unsavory business, and informants often lie,'' he said. "How trustworthy is his information? No one knows.''
Legal experts said that there have been a number of legal challenges to FBI surveillance practices since the 1970s but that the current lawsuit is among the first to accuse the agency of targeting people based on religion.
Monteilh, a Los Angeles native, has said he became an informant for a federal-state task force in 2003 and was later recruited by the FBI for counterterrorism cases. Agents, he said, provided his cover: Farouk al-Aziz, a French Syrian in search of his Islamic roots. His code name was "Oracle."
Monteilh said he was instructed to infiltrate mosques throughout Orange County and two neighboring counties in Southern California but was told to focus on the Islamic Center of Irvine.
Members of that mosque have said Monteilh attended prayers five times a day, and he has said he tape-recorded Muslims at the mosques, in their homes and at a gym. He helped build a terrorism-related case against a mosque member, but the case collapsed.
The lawsuit says that Monteilh's handlers, FBI agents Kevin Armstrong and Paul Allen, instructed him to collect e-mail addresses, phone numbers and other detailed information about Muslims and "explicitly told Monteilh that Islam was a threat to America's national security. ''
Through an FBI spokeswoman, the two agents declined to comment.
Ali Malik, a plaintiff in the lawsuit who helped teach Monteilh about Islam at the Irvine mosque, said the Muslim community has yet to recover from Monteilh's actions.
"A lot of people now see the mosque as a place where the government can just come in and spy on you,'' said Malik, who says he has been questioned by the FBI several times since his dealings with Monteilh. "It's going to take a long time to heal those wounds.''

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California has named Peter Eliasberg, Ahilan Arulanantham and Belinda Escobosa Helzer to head up its legal team in Los Angeles and Orange County.
“I am extremely pleased to name Peter, Ahilan, and Belinda to these leadership positions. They have distinguished themselves in their passionate devotion to and defense of civil liberties and civil rights,” said Hector Villagra, executive director of the ACLU/SC. “Through their expertise and vision, they will ensure that the legal advocacy of the ACLU of Southern California remains at the forefront.”
Eliasberg, 50, has been named to succeed Villagra as the legal director of the ACLU of Southern California. His appointment fills the vacancy left by Villagra, who became executive director of the ACLU/SC on Feb. 15.
Eliasberg joined the ACLU/SC in 1996 and until February 2011 served as the Managing Attorney at the ACLU Foundation of Southern California and the Manheim Family Attorney for First Amendment Rights.
“It’s a great honor for me to have a job held by such legendary attorneys as Paul Okrand, Paul L. Hoffman, Mark Rosenbaum and Hector Villagra,” Eliasberg said. “It’s also a challenge given the incredible pressures confronting civil rights and liberties.”
During his time at the ACLU/SC Eliasberg, has worked on landmark civil rights cases. He represented Frank Buono in the United States Supreme Court in an Establishment Clause challenge to the presence of a cross on federal land in Buono v. Salazar (aka Salazar v. Buono, in the United States Supreme Court).
He has also represented a group of bus riders with disabilities who sued the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority over the agency’s failure to provide accessible buses. And in Williams v. State of California, he represented a class of school children challenging the State of California's failure to provide basic education necessities -- including clean and safe school facilities, adequate textbooks, and trained teachers.
Villagra also announced Arulanantham will become the ACLU/SC deputy legal director. Arulanantham, 38, joined the ACLU/SC in 2004 and until February 2011 served as the Director of Immigrants’ Rights and National Security.
“I’m excited to take on this new role and help the ACLU/SC respond to the human and civil rights challenges facing Southern California residents,” said Arulanantham.
Arulanantham has successfully litigated several landmark cases, including a challenge to the federal government’s policy of forcibly drugging immigrants during deportation efforts and several cases on behalf of people detained as national security threats, both in the United States and abroad.
The ACLU/SC has also named Belinda Escobosa Helzer as the director of the Orange County office. Escobosa Helzer, 38,joined the ACLU/SC in 2005, where she has served as a staff attorney in the Orange County office.
Escobosa Helzer has worked as counsel on civil rights cases ranging from free speech, to religious freedom, due process and law enforcement abuse. In Vietnamese Budddhism Study Temple of America v. City of Garden Grove, she sued Garden Grove officials to protect the rights of a Vietnamese Buddhist congregation to build a temple in that city. The lawsuit led to a settlement that allowed the congregation to build its temple and freely worship together.
“As a lifelong resident of Orange County, I am honored to continue to fight for and protect the civil rights of all residents in the region,” Escobosa Helzer said.