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Roger Stone is insisting the allegations about his connections to Russia are unfounded.

They have no proof of it and it was unnecessary, Stone, who advised Donald TrumpDonald TrumpBreitbart denied congressional press passes: report Conservatism's worst enemy? The Freedom Caucus. The Hill's 12:30 Report MORE's presidential campaign, said during Politico's "Off Message" podcast.

As someone said, the Russians don't play American politics very well. That's true, although I never heard from them.

Stone faces scrutiny for communicating with Guccifer 2.0, the alias of a hacker the U.S. intelligence community believes is associated with the Russian government. Stone has admitted to the contact but called it "completely innocuous."

I was referring to what II mean, through the intermediary, which I see the headlines. No, I didn't admit that. I announced it. I didn't admit it. I announced it. It is not illegal and it was not direct, as I've said a dozen times, Stone said.

I didn't misspeak. This covers the question of communication through an intermediary.

When asked about the attempts of White House aides to distance Stone from Trump, Stone said "perhaps they are cautious because they, of course, don't know how this ends."

He also called White House press secretary Sean Spicer's comments about Paul Manafort playing a limited role in Trump's campaign, despite being its chairman from March to August 2016, an "effort to put their distance, I guess, between them and Paul Manafort."

Stone was asked at the end of the interview if he would refuse to answer any of the committee's questions, citing his Fifth Amendment rights.

"No," he said. "Why would I?"

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Roger Stone on allegations of Russian ties: 'They have no proof' - The Hill

After years of negotiations, Canyon Lake Property Owners Association (CLPOA) and Elisnore Valley Water Municipal District (EVMWD) entered into a Fifth Amendment to the Lake Lease on March 10, 2017.

What does this mean for Canyon Lake? For one, the Lake Lease that would have expired on December 31, 2022 doesnt expire now until December 31, 2066. With the Fifth Amendment in effect, it also gives CLPOA a unilateral option to extend the Lease another 44 years after 2066 and on the same conditions and terms as are now in effect.

It also means that the Lake Lease payments that were being adjusted every year according to the cost of water will now be adjusted on a yearly basis based on the Consumer Price Index. Additionally, CLPOAs Lake Lease payments will never increase more than four percent per year. The minimum increase will be one percent per year.

CLPOA feels this is a fair and stable payment schedule and projects that it will save CLPOA millions of dollars just over the next 10 years alone. How does this benefit EVMWD? EVMWD gets the benefit of having a predictable and stable revenue stream from the Lake.

During the negotiations, EVMWD was insisting that CLPOA agrees to an onerous indemnity provision that would require CLPOA to indemnify EVMWD for all loss related to the Lake, even if the loss was EVMWDs fault. With the Fifth Amendment in effect, EVMWD is responsible for its mistakes, CLPOA is responsible for its mistakes, as well as those of its members and third parties.

Prior to the Fifth Amendment, there was no mechanism in the Lake Lease to prevent disputes between CLPOA and EMVWD from spiraling out of control. With the Fifth Amendment to the Lake Lease, there are now mechanisms in place to help head off any disputes that may arise between CLPOA and EVMWD. Specifically, there will now be an Interface Committee, comprised of CLPOA Board Members and EVMWD Board Members, who will meet as necessary to discuss any dispute between the parties that may arise. If the dispute persists, the dispute must then go to mediation, before a neutral third party, to see if the parties can voluntarily resolve the dispute. If mediation doesnt work, the dispute is submitted to streamlined arbitration, so it is resolved as quickly and efficiently as possible.

The section of the Lake north of the north causeway, where the river feeds into the lake, is known as Section 26 of the Lake. This section was governed by a separate lease agreement between CLPOA and EVMWD. EVMWD had the ability to grant rights of use to Section 26 to others, under certain conditions. Now, with the Fifth Amendment to the Lake Lease in effect, Section 26 will be governed by the same Lake Lease; however, some special provisions will apply.

EVMWD is permitted to install fencing or other access control devices around Section 26 to prevent visitors from using this portion of the Lake. Section 26 will remain open to CLPOA and its members for the same uses that were previously in effect.

Prior to the Fifth Amendment, there were no requirements with respect to CLPOAs insurance of the Lake. With the Fifth Amendment in effect, CLPOA is required to maintain general liability insurance on the Lake, with EVMWD as an additional named insured, at amounts reasonable to cover any anticipated losses.

According to CLPOA, the current amount is $2MM per occurrence/$2MM in the aggregate. CLPOA and EVMWD have agreed to review the insurance limits on a periodic basis to see if any increase is needed. With this insurance in place, it will help to prevent any disputes between CLPOA and EVMWD.

Is the litigation between CLPOA and EVMWD over? Not all of it. The Tax Case (Riverside Superior Court Case No. RIC 1504034) which is now on appeal (Court of Appeal Case No. CIV NO. E065705) will be dismissed; however, the Declaratory Relief Case (Riverside Superior Court Case No. 1503428) is still pending.

The reason why the Declaratory Relief Case is still pending is because there are still a few important issues, which were not the subject of the Fifth Amendment, that need to be resolved. Both parties are seeking a definitive determination as to where the border of the Lake and shorezone actually lies. The parties also want to come to create a uniform process for future encroachments into the Lake/onto the shorezone, which involves all the necessary stakeholders (CLPOA, CLPOAs Members and EVMWD).

CLPOA wants to be sure that everyone is on the same page in terms of what improvements are being maintained in the Lake/on the shorezone. Currently, there is no standard process between the stakeholders as to what improvements are being maintained, which could lead to inconsistent rights and obligations between CLPOA and EVMWD as to the improvements and property involved. CLPOA wants to change that so that everything is as fair, consistent and predictable as possible. CLPOA says they are committed to cooperating with EVMWD to resolve these remaining issues.

A spokesperson for CLPOA said This truly is a monumental step forward. We are very pleased that hard work from both sides, and the patience and participation of CLPOAs members, has produced this durable and lasting agreement, which will preserve the special character of the Canyon Lake community for decades to come.

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CLPOA enters into Fifth Amendment to Lake Lease | The Friday Flyer - The Friday Flyer

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Rep. Tim Walberg of Michigan have introduced legislation to reform civil asset forfeiture, a practice by which law enforcement agencies seize the property and assets of individuals with minimal due process.

The practice has encouraged policing for profit, distorting the mission of police agencies toward revenue generation to the detriment of the property rights of Americans. Pauls and Walbergs bill should unite those concerned with upholding constitutional rights and justice more broadly.

The FAIR (Fifth Amendment Integrity Restoration) Act, previously introduced by Paul in 2014, seeks to shore up the rights of Americans facing civil asset forfeiture proceedings and curb the perverse profit incentives which underline the practice.

The federal government has made it far too easy for government agencies to take and profit from the property of those who have not been convicted of a crime, said Paul. The FAIR Act will protect Americans Fifth Amendment rights from being infringed upon by ensuring that government agencies no longer profit from taking the property of U.S. citizens without due process.

Under current practices, federal agencies, often in partnership with state and local police departments, may seize a persons cash, home or vehicle simply upon the suspicion that such assets were connected to criminal activity. One need not even be charged or convicted of a crime to have personal assets permanently seized.

All the government needs to do is meet the relatively low standard of a preponderance of the evidence to prevail in court while innocent owners have the burden of trying to prove their innocence and bearing the costs of legally opposing government authorities.

This has created a situation where the federal government has seized billions of dollars in assets under questionable circumstances. According to the Institute for Justice, from 2001 to 2014, the forfeiture funds of the Department of Justice and Treasury Department took in nearly $29 billion. This provides financial incentive to both federal agencies and state and local partners, who get a cut of the money through equitable sharing, to increasingly focus on cases with revenue-generating potential.

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To ameliorate the litany of problems associated with civil asset forfeiture, the FAIR Act does a number of important things consistent with the values this nation was founded upon. Among other things, the FAIR Act removes the profit incentives involved by directing proceeds of federal civil asset forfeiture to the Treasurys General Fund to be used at the discretion of Congress, rather than federal agencies. Doing this also ends the practice of equitable sharing, thereby reducing the incentives of state and local law enforcement agencies to prioritize revenue-generation.

The current system disadvantages the innocent, who often lack the resources to take on the federal government. The FAIR Act seeks to restore the rights of innocent property owners, by requiring clear and convincing evidence of a persons guilt, rather than a mere preponderance of the evidence. The FAIR Act also provides indigent property owners counsel if they need it, no small issue considering the federal government has more than enough money and lawyers on hand to intimidate most Americans.

Civil asset forfeiture defies the very notion of limited, constitutionally restrained government. We encourage a bipartisan effort to rein in the abuses of civil asset forfeiture by working to pass the FAIR Act.

Read the original here:
End perverse incentives for seizing assets - Los Angeles Daily News - LA Daily News

by Eric Frederiksen | March 21, 2017

The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects American citizens from incriminating themselves, but it seems forgotten passwords dont always fall under that. The US Third Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a ruling of contempt from a lower court over a mans claimed inability to remember his drive-decryption password.

A computer, pair of iPhones, and two external drives belonging to the anonymous defendant were seized as part of a child pornography investigation. The court ruling states that the defendant voluntarily provided the password for his iPhones but refused to offer up the passwords for his Apple Mac Pro or external hard drives. Forensic analysts were able to recover the password for the computer, but not the drives. When asked to enter in the passwords for his drives, the defendant entered in a number of incorrect passwords. The judge, however, didnt believe the defendant, and it eventually came out that he did have the passwords and had chosen not to reveal them because of the devices contents.

The court already knew a bit about what it was getting into. In the process of analysis, those forensic analysts had discovered file signatures on the defendants computer that matched the hash values of known child pornography files. They also had testimony from the defendants sister that he had shown her said files on the external hard drives. The court ended up ruling that being forced to produce a password did not count as testimony and, as a result, did not fall under the protection of the Fifth Amendment.

In this particular case, the court had compelling evidence to force the issue, and this is the kind of situation where we want to see justice done, but it could potentially set a dangerous precedent. The Electronic Frontier Foundation toldThe Register that any time suspects are forced to disclose contents of their mind, thats enough to trigger the Fifth Amendment, end of story.

Meanwhile, other legal experts note that data encryption is now standard within many businesses, and an inability to force decryption makes these companies effectively immune from discovery and subpoenas.

The balance between personal privacy and pursuit of justice has never been murkier than it is in the current age of everything-encryption. There simply isnt as much physical evidence for investigators to pore over, and much of the digital evidence is locked up in encryption. At the same time, citizens have a right to privacy and to protecting that privacy.

The EFFs senior staff attorney Mark Rumold expects this question to climb its way up the courts and said he wouldnt be surprised to see the issue make its way to the Supreme Court.

Excerpt from:
The Fifth Amendment may not protect our passwords, US Court of Appeals says - TechnoBuffalo

I have blogged a few times about a pending 3rd Circuit case on the Fifth Amendment standard for compelling the decryption of a hard drive. As I explained, the case presents an opportunity to weigh in on the 11th Circuits standard in a similar case that I think was erroneous. The 3rd Circuit handed down its decision this morning, United States v. Apple Mac Pro Computer. The court ruled for the government without resolving which standard applies. In a footnote, however, the court hinted that it disagreed with the 11th Circuit and would have adopted the standard that I think is right if it had to choose. Its just dicta, but its pretty strongly worded dicta.

I explained the legal issue in glorious detail in my prior post, but heres a quick overview. If the foregone conclusion doctrine applies, the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination doesnt bar the act of compelling entering in a password. The question is: What does the government need to show to establish a foregone conclusion? The 11th Circuit had held in its prior case that the government needs to show that the government knows with reasonable particularity what files are on the encrypted device. In my view, thats wrong. The foregone conclusion doctrine applies if the government can show that it knows that the subject knows the passcode.

The 3rd Circuit held that the Fifth Amendment issue was not preserved below, but that even if it should be reached it would not be plain error to say that there was no Fifth Amendment privilege:

Even if we could assess the Fifth Amendment decision of the Magistrate Judge, our review would be limited to plain error. See United States v. Schwartz, 446 F.2d 571, 576 (3d Cir. 1971) (applying plain error review to unpreserved claim of violation of privilege against self-incrimination). Does arguments fail under this deferential standard of review.

The 11th Circuits ruling was distinguishable on its facts:

Unlike [the 11th Circuits case], the Government has provided evidence to show both that files exist on the encrypted portions of the devices and that Doe can access them. . . . Based on these facts, the Magistrate Judge found that, for the purposes of the Fifth Amendment, any testimonial component of the production of decrypted devices added little or nothing to the information already obtained by the Government. The Magistrate Judge determined that any testimonial component would be a foregone conclusion. The Magistrate Judge did not commit a clear or obvious error in his application of the foregone conclusion doctrine.

The 3rd Circuit then dropped this very intriguing footnote, with a paragraph break added by me:

It is important to note that we are not concluding that the Governments knowledge of the content of the devices is necessarily the correct focus of the foregone conclusion inquiry in the context of a compelled decryption order. Instead, a very sound argument can be made that the foregone conclusion doctrine properly focuses on whether the Government already knows the testimony that is implicit in the act of production. In this case, the fact known to the government that is implicit in the act of providing the password for the devices is I, John Doe, know the password for these devices. Based upon the testimony presented at the contempt proceeding, that fact is a foregone conclusion.

However, because our review is limited to plain error, and no plain error was committed by the District Court in finding that the Government established that the contents of the encrypted hard drives are known to it, we need not decide here that the inquiry can be limited to the question of whether Does knowledge of the password itself is sufficient to support application of the foregone conclusion doctrine.

Theres a lot in that footnote that the government can use in future cases. Its dicta, but its very strong dicta. The issue will live for another day without a circuit split. But given that I think the footnote is correct, I hope it will be followed in future cases.

Go here to see the original:
Third Circuit doesn't resolve standard for forced decryption under the Fifth Amendment - Washington Post