The Denver Police Department planned to receive intelligence information from the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI) about the identities and activities of participants in a peaceful demonstration outside Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs in 1999, according to a document from the Denver Police Spy Files released today by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Colorado (ACLU).
The disclosure supplements related documents disclosed by the ACLU last November that indicate that the Colorado Springs Police Department collected information at the same demonstration and reported it back to Denver for inclusion in the Spy Files.
The document disclosed today states that on March 27, 1999, Denver intelligence officers "monitored" the office of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), where protesters gathered to car pool to a demonstration at the Air Force base sponsored by Citizens for Peace in Space, the Pikes Peak Justice & Peace Commission, and AFSC. The report notes that about 20 individuals arrived at the AFSC office, and it includes the license plate numbers of about a dozen vehicles, along with information identifying the owner and the organization with which the owner is identified. The report states that the demonstrators then left in four vehicles, which are identified by asterisks in the report. It states that the protesters who drove from Denver spent about an hour at the air force base, where they were joined by approximately 80 additional individuals. According to the report, "there were no arrests or incidents."
The report concludes by stating that "Colorado Springs PD and AF OSI monitored the group and will supply intelligence information soon."
"This document indicates that the Denver Police Department expected to receive information about the participants in a peaceful demonstration from both the Air Force Office of Special Investigations as well as the Colorado Springs Police Department," said Mark Silverstein, ACLU Legal Director. "As the related document disclosed in November confirms, the Denver police did in fact receive license plate numbers and other identifying information about thirty individuals who were identified as participants, and that information went straight into the Denver police Spy Files."
"Although this document refers to intelligence information that the Denver police department expected to receive from the Air Force," Silverstein continued, "the sharing of intelligence information surely goes both ways. This document raises questions about the extent to which the Denver Police Department has shared information from the Spy Files - including the false and defamatory characterization of peaceful groups as "criminal extremist" -- with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations and other federal agencies as well."
The AFSC is one of the plaintiffs in the ACLU's ongoing class action lawsuit that challenges the Denver Police Department's Spy Files and the practice of monitoring peaceful protesters and keeping files on the expressive activities of peaceful critics of government policy.