One example of so-called "anti-terror" legislation going ridiculously wrong

.

The British have - thanks to Blair - some of the least acceptable so-called "anti-terrorism" laws.

A law that enables police to stop & search just about everyone is a great example for how this 'terror' craze can go wrong.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/8034315.stm

The Metropolitan Police used section 44 of the Terrorism Act more than 170,000 times in 2008 to stop people in London.

That compares to almost 72,000 anti-terror stop and searches carried out in the previous year.

The Met said anti-terror searches had been more widely used since the planting of two car bombs in central London in July 2007.

Of all the stops last year, only 65 led to arrests for terror offences, a success rate of just 0.035%.

http://boingboing.net/2009/05/05/london-cops-catch-an.html

Note, they don't say that there were 65 convictions, or even 65 sustained charges, just 65 arrests.

http://boingboing.net/2009/09/10/uk-police-watchdog-f.html

The UK police watchdog is finally looking into the widespread use of anti-terrorism stop-and-search powers by cops. The event that spurred them into it? Two plainclothes cops stopped a 43-year-old man and his 11-year-old daughter and her six-year-old friend. They took the man's USB sticks, phones, camera and CD, made him stand in front of a CCTV to be photographed, and then they searched and photographed the children.

They never told the man where he could go to get his property returned. They never returned it. Where I come from, that's called "being mugged."

A group called "Love Police" seems to be dedicated to expose the needless stop & search efforts.

Sven Ortmann

.