Anti-discrimination group sues TSA over 'no fly' list

The American Civil Liberties Union on Tuesday filed suit on behalf of seven plaintiffs who allege that the federal "no fly" list violates airline passengers' rights to due process and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure.

The group sued in federal district court in Seattle, requesting that the Transportation Security Administration admit that the list violates constitutional rights and that the agency develop a system that does not discriminate against innocent passengers.

Maintained by TSA, the no-fly list contains the names of suspected terrorists. Since its inception, however, the list has caused confusion among people who have the same names as terrorist suspects, and some innocent passengers have found it difficult to have their names removed.

"Our clients are totally innocent" and have been subject to treatment that is "much more than a minor inconvenience," said Reginald Shuford, ACLU's senior staff attorney and lead counsel in the case. "The worst part is that there is no way at all to clear one's name."

Plaintiff David Fahti, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU's National Prison Project in Washington, said he has been stopped at least five times at various airports and was threatened with indefinite detainment by customs officials at Dulles International Airport even after he produced his U.S. passport, a District of Columbia driver's license and a letter from TSA.

"This indiscriminant dragnet ... is not making anybody safer," Fahti said. Being detained should be "based on behavior ... not presence on a poorly maintained list."

Fahti's repeated attempts to determine how his name was placed on the list and how it could be removed resulted in a "complete stonewall" by TSA, he said. After his request for access to the information, the agency revealed after six months that it had 33 pages of information on Fahti but released only four due to security concerns. The four pages were mostly blacked out, Fahti said.

None of the plaintiffs in the case missed their flights or incurred any significant damages, so the ACLU suit does not seek monetary compensation. It requests that TSA devise a better plan of action because ACLU's lack of information on the no-fly list "prevents our devising a remedy," Shuford said. "It's ultimately their responsibility."

"When the government starts singling you out for negative treatment, it's hard to know when that's going to stop," Fahti said.

Other plaintiffs in the suit include: a 36-year-old master sergeant in the Air Force; a 34-year-old attorney from Illinois; a 74-year-old retired Presbyterian minister; a 51-year-old nonprofit employee; a 22-year-old college student studying abroad in Paris; and a 26-year-old ACLU worker from Seattle.