[12650] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Gov demanding PGP key
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Willis Marti)
Wed May 25 12:12:22 1994
From: Willis Marti <willis@cs.tamu.edu>
Date: Wed, 25 May 1994 07:28:19 -0500
To: DBURK@gmuvax.gmu.edu, com-priv@psi.com
"DAN L. BURK" <DBURK@gmuvax.gmu.edu> writes:
>Willis Marti writes:
>
>> I'd suggest the prosecutor prove the allegation some legtimate way, in some
>> manner that avoids violating the Constitution. If this was not a criminal
>> case, do you think the government has the right to compell you to disclose
>> anything it wants?
>
>As I mentioned in my previous post, refusal to obey a subpeona is likely to
>be *civil* contempt, not criminal. If it were criminal, a bunch of extra due
>process rights would kick in.
>
>The misunderstanding here seems to be that it's not the government ordering
>production, its *the court.* The prosecutor makes his arguments, the defense
>makes theirs, and the court decides. If the court decides the subpeona should
>issue, then refusal is an affront to the inherent authority of the court, and
>will be dealt with as contempt.
>
>The moral to the story is that if you can't convince the court not to issue the
>subpeona in the first place, you're either going to have to comply or spend an
>indefinite amount of time in the county jail (not prison, mind you -- you won't
>have been charged or convicted of a *crime.*)
Cool! So if one calls it a civil matter, then one can do all sorts of neat
things, like imprison someone without a trial, or take away their money just
for grins.
Seriously, the 8th Amendment might seem to apply even in civil cases. The
subpoena is a product of "common law" countries -- but does it really give
the court/government/etc the right to get any information it decides it wants?
