PATRIOT ACT USED BROADLY, U.S. SAYS

Powers Applied To Cases With No Terror Links

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration, which calls the USA Patriot Act
perhaps its most essential tool in fighting terrorists, has begun using the
law with increasing frequency in many criminal investigations that have
little or no connection to terrorism.

The government is using its expanded authority under the far-reaching law
to investigate alleged drug-traffickers, white-collar criminals,
blackmailers, child pornographers, money launderers, spies and even corrupt
foreign leaders, federal officials said.

Justice Department officials say they are simply using all the tools now
available to them to pursue criminals -- terrorists or otherwise. But
critics of the administration's anti-terrorism tactics assert that such use
of the law is evidence that the administration has sold the American public
a false bill of goods, using terrorism as a guise to pursue a broader law
enforcement agenda.

Justice Department officials point out that they have employed their
newfound powers in many instances against terrorism suspects. With the new
law breaking down the wall between intelligence and criminal
investigations, the Justice Department in February was able to bring
terrorism-related charges against a Florida professor, for example, and it
has used its expanded surveillance powers to move against several alleged
terrorist cells.

But a new Justice Department report, given to members of Congress this
month, also cites more than a dozen cases that are not directly related to
terrorism. In them, federal authorities have used their expanded power to
investigate individuals, initiate wiretaps and other surveillance, or seize
millions in tainted assets.

For instance, the ability to secure nationwide warrants to obtain e-mail
and electronic evidence ``has proved invaluable in several sensitive
non-terrorism investigations,'' including the tracking of an unidentified
fugitive and an investigation into a computer hacker who stole a company's
trade secrets, the report said.

The authorities have also used toughened penalties under the law to press
charges against a lovesick 20-year-old woman from Orange County who planted
threatening notes aboard a Hawaii-bound cruise ship she was traveling on
with her family in May.

The woman, who said she made the threats to try to return home to her
boyfriend, was sentenced last week to two years in federal prison because
of a provision in the Patriot Act about the threat of terrorism against
mass-transportation systems.

The law, passed by Congress just five weeks after the terror attacks of
Sept. 11, 2001, has already drawn sharp opposition from those who believe
it gives the government too much power to intrude on people's privacy in
pursuit of terrorists.

Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union,
said, "Once the American public understands that many of the powers granted
to the federal government apply to much more than just terrorism, I think
the opposition will gain momentum.''

Justice Department officials said such criticism has not deterred them.
"There are many provisions in the Patriot Act that can be used in the
general criminal law,'' Mark Corallo, a department official, said. "And I
think any reasonable person would agree that we have an obligation to do
everything we can to protect the lives and liberties of Americans from
attack, whether it's from terrorists or garden-variety criminals.''