It wasn’t planned this way, but as the articles came in for this month’s edition, a theme emerged: the uses, handling and consequences of information.

On the federal level, that led to the creation of the National Counterterrorism Center and the National Director of Intelligence. In the 2003 Homeland Security Presidential Directives (HSPDs) 5, 7 and 8, the ground was laid for improved preparedness and better coordination between federal and local agencies. States, localities and, especially, regions absorbed the message. This gave impetus to a movement to create “fusion centers” where information from law enforcement, federal intelligence and other sources could be synthesized and analyzed. In this edition, Philip Leggiere provides an overview of the movement, and Kelley Vlahos chronicles its implementation in the National Capital Region.

But just connecting the dots is not a universal panacea. Consider the case of Boston as detailed by Jeff O’Neill, our local correspondent. There, the dots really did seem to be connecting toward a terrorist plot—but in fact they had a completely different explanation. (And let it be said that Boston authorities acted absolutely appropriately and with proper force given the events as they unfolded.)

Or consider what happened to Maher Arar as chronicled by WR Stephens, our Toronto correspondent. Inaccuracy and information mishandling resulted in devastating effects on an innocent individual who was deported to Syria, where he was tortured. As a result of an exhaustive Canadian government inquiry, the details of the case are now available for public scrutiny.

Just before press time, another case of the power of information came to light in a local newspaper, the Naples Daily News in Naples, Fla.

This is the case of Louis Dorcellian, a Haitian immigrant to the United States who followed all the legal steps for asylum, married another Haitian immigrant residing legally in the United States, was working productively and began raising a family, thinking he was secure in his legal status. However, following a minor traffic stop for too many trinkets hanging from a rear-view mirror, Dorcellian was arrested when his name showed up in an immigration database—but without the notation that he had filed for an adjustment of his legal status after an initial denial of asylum. To make matters worse, it occurred hours before he was to board an airplane to become a legal refugee in Canada.

Dorcellian was deported back to Haiti on Dec. 27, 2006, leaving behind a pregnant wife and five children—and facing a situation in which he claimed he was subject to political persecution.

At HSToday’s press time, Dorcellian’s wife and lawyers were asking the Department of Homeland Security to waive a 10-year bar against his re-entry to the United States.

This was a case where the slowness of the immigration system and the failure of a database to include all current information on an individual’s status had a devastating impact on someone who had tried to obey the law and follow the rules.

Power and responsibility

These cases demonstrate the tremendous power that official information has over the lives of individuals. As this information is increasingly aggregated and shared among more agencies at different levels of government, the costs of errors, inaccuracies and mishandling become ever greater. Anyone who has tried to correct a computerized billing error or untangle the knot of an identity theft knows the time-consuming frustration of working through a seemingly impenetrable system. That experience can be multiplied tenfold when the error is in official databases, and the consequences can be arrest, deportation or worse.

There is a real terrorist threat to the American homeland, and collecting and sharing information is a critical defense against it. We don’t hold with those who believe that all government data collection and sharing is somehow evil—it’s the only way to protect the people of the civilized world against the barbarism of terrorists.

However, these kinds of cases are important reminders to those who handle this information of the awesome trust that comes with it and the need to handle the resulting power justly, responsibly, lawfully and very, very carefully. HST