The Supreme Court refused yesterday to hear a suit brought by members of the Jewish Defense League asking for damages from government officials who conducted an “illegal” wiretap against them in 1970 and 1971. The High Court let stand a decision by a United States Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia that suggested that officials may escape paying damages if they could demonstrate that they had sincerely believed the wiretap to be proper.
The JDL suit was against former Attorney General John Mitchell and nine present or former members of the FBI. During a trial against 13 JDL members for gun conspiracy in June 1970, the government revealed it had wiretapped conversations of 10 of the defendants without a warrant.
The District of Columbia Court of Appeals ruled that the wiretaps were illegal since the government may use wiretaps without warrants only if the evidence that the target of the wiretap was a foreign agent or a collaborator with a foreign agent.
Federal law provides that the victim of an illegal government for each violation. But the law says that “a good faith reliance on a court order or legislative authorization shall constitute a complete defense” for government officials. Attorneys for the JDL argued that the wiretaps went beyond the intent of the law.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
