经济学人:纽约的警察同志们,有木有玩过头了?

BECAUSE of the September 2001 attacks, the New York Police Department has become a sophisticated counter-terrorism agency. In the decade since then the NYPD has increased the number of detectives on a joint task-force it has long operated with the FBI from 17 to more than 100. It hired a former senior CIA spook to head its intelligence division. Detectives have been posted all over the world, in Abu Dhabi, Amman, Israel, London and Madrid, among other places.
2001年的911恐怖袭击事件后，美国纽约警方由此变成了一个资深的反恐机构。在911事件发生的十年时间内，纽约警方已经和美国联邦调查局合作侦查的案件从17起突增到100起。纽约警察局雇佣了前任中情局的高级侦探来领导他们的情报部门。其探员遍布在阿布扎比，阿曼，以色列，伦敦以及马德里等世界各个地区。

Scores of native speakers of around 50 languages, including Arabic, Dari, Persian, Urdu, Pushup and Bengali, have been hired—some say the NYPD has more Arabic speakers than the FBI. It has, at times, irritated both the CIA and the FBI, who are jealous guardians of their turf. But the results have spoken for themselves. Several plots to devastate New York have been foiled, including plans to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge, the stock exchange and Times Square.
许多会说当地语言的本地人都被雇佣起来了，包括阿拉伯语，波斯语，乌尔都语，Pushup和保加利亚语。其中一部分的人说纽约警方所雇佣的阿拉伯人比FBI还要多。偶尔，这会激怒中情局和联邦调查局两个强势机构，他们都是怀着十分嫉妒情绪的人群。但是事情往往证明了他们的想法。有若干的情节还是会相当严重的，包括破坏布鲁克林大桥，纽交所以及时代广场。

The NYPD has been duly applauded for all this. Last year Barack Obama’s head of counter-terrorism called its efforts “heroic”. But now it may have overstepped the mark. According to an exposé by the Associated Press, the NYPD has been monitoring Muslims not just in New York, but also across the Hudson river (and the state line) in Newark, New Jersey. It appears to have done so for no better reason than that its targets practise Islam.
纽约警方一直都以此为荣。去年，奥巴马政府的反恐组织头目高度赞扬他们的行为并称之为“极富有英雄主义色彩”。但是，现在他可能已经越过“雷池”很多了。根据美国联合通讯社的一则曝光内容称纽约警方不仅一直监视着在纽约地区的穆斯林们，而且还越过哈德逊河监视着在新泽西州的纽瓦克市的穆斯林。这样的行为明显已经超出仅仅是针对伊斯兰的目标了。

A 60-page “demographics” report about Newark’s Muslims, compiled by NYPD’s Intelligence Division, includes photographs of shops, restaurants and a school that are owned or frequented by Muslims. It also catalogues information about Muslims on Long Island. And the NYPD has kept a close eye on students on several campuses in the north-east, including Rutgers, Columbia and Yale. An undercover cop apparently even went with students on a white-water rafting trip.
一份六十页的由纽约警方的情报部门汇编的关于纽瓦克市的穆斯林报告，包括商店店铺，餐馆以及有穆斯林学生学校的照片，还包括了一些在长岛地区的穆斯林的信息分类。并且纽约警方还密切监视着在美国东北部地区的若干大学的穆斯林学生，包括纽泽西州立大学，哥伦比亚大学以及耶鲁大学。甚至还有便衣警察在与那些学生漂流的时候趁机与其接触并展开调查。

Muslims and civil-rights groups are angry and anxious about all this. Parents are advising their children not to join Muslim student groups. Azka Mohyuddin, one such student, worries that her name will end up on a “do-not-fly” list. Cory Booker, Newark’s mayor, and Chris Christie, New Jersey’s governor, who were not informed about the NYPD’s activities, are not happy either. New Jersey’s attorney-general is looking into the matter, and the federal Justice Department is wondering whether to investigate the complaints. This being America, a class-action lawsuit is looking likely. But Ray Kelly, the police commissioner, defended his force in a speech on March 3rd, saying it would be folly to ignore what takes place outside the city. “If terrorists are not limited by borders and boundaries”, he said, “we can’t be either.”
穆斯林和人权组织对此表示十分的愤怒和忧虑。家长们则建议他们的子女最好远离穆斯林学生群体。Azka Mohyuddin就是这样的一个的一名学生，她担心她会被列入不予培养的名单当中。纽瓦克市市长Cory Booker，以及新西南州州长Chris Christie，都不知道纽约警方的这一系列的行为。他们对此也表示十分的反感。新泽西州的司法部长已经着手介入调查。联邦司法部门正在犹豫是否去调查这样的一些抱怨之声。在美国，这样的一场集体诉讼可能即将要上演。但是，警察委员会委员长Ray Kelly在三月三号的一次演讲中力挺他们这样的行动，并认为忽略这个城市以外将发生的事情是一件十分愚蠢的事情。“如果恐怖分子不受制于国界与边界，我们当然也就不会这样做了”

At the federal level, mechanisms are in place to keep agents in check. In New York the NYPD has to abide by the so-called Handschu guidelines, which are designed to keep the police from investigating a person or group solely because of politics or religion; they need something concrete to go on. But the guidelines were relaxed after the 2001 attacks, and are anyway open to broad interpretation. Faiza Patel of the Brennan Centre for Justice feels that an independent oversight authority, like the inspector-general in Los Angeles, may be needed.
事件上升到联邦的级别，机制的存在是为了让机构能够有效的运行。在纽约，警方的力量被那些所谓的Handschu规则所限制，这样的一种机制是专门为了阻止警方因为宗教和政治的原因去单独随意地调查一个人或者一个团体，而是需要一些具体的措施来跟进。但是这样的一些规则在2001年的恐怖袭击之后开始睁一只眼闭一只眼了，对涉及的一些问题给出了一些更宽泛的解释来作为一个所谓的掩饰。布鲁南司法中心的Faiza Patel认为一个像洛杉矶的综合监管机构那样的独立的监管机构是非常有存在的必要的。

The irony about this surveillance, says Eugene O’Donnell of John Jay College of Criminal Justice—a former policeman himself—is that it is alienating the very groups the NYPD need to keep sweet in order to induce them to give information about extremists. “This dragnet approach was a recipe for trouble,” he says.
但是，刑事司法学院的约翰•杰伊，原来曾身为一位警察的他却认为这样的一个监管本身就是一件很讽刺的事情，因为机构本身会疏远很多纽约警察厅想要亲近的群体来诱使他们提供一些关于极端分子的信息。只能说是自作孽不可活。