‘Vikram Buddhi was discriminated against’
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Vietnam, he would first target then President Lyndon B
Johnson. Watts was tried for threatening to kill the President
and the matter ended up before the US Supreme Court. It
ruled that a statute ‘which makes criminal a form of pure
speech, must be interpreted with the commands of the First
Amendment clearly in mind. What is a threat must be distin-
guished from what is constitutionally protected speech.’
In Watts, the US Supreme Court ruled that in speech threat
cases, the context must be considered, that there should be an
examination of the speech to see if there is political opposi-
tion to the President and his executive team, and if the threat
is a true threat. Watts was acquitted by the Supreme Court,
which concluded that in the context of Vietnam War, Watts’s
speech was political hyperbole expressing political opposition
to President and that there was no true threat to the
President.
It stated: ‘We do not believe that the kind of political hyper-
bole indulged in by petitioner fits within that statutory term.
For we must interpret the language Congress chose against
the background of a profound national commitment to the
principle that debate on public issues should be unin-
hibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well
include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasant-
ly sharp attacks on government and public officials –
New York Times Co versis Sullivan, 376 US 254, 270
(1964). The language of the political arena, like the
language used in labor disputes — see Linn versus
United Plant Guard Workers of America, 383 US 53,
58 (1966) — is often vituperative, abusive, and inexact.
We agree with petitioner that his only offense here was
‘a kind of very crude offensive method of stating a
political opposition to the President.’ Taken in context,
and regarding the expressly conditional nature of the
statement and the reaction of the listeners, we do not
see how it could be interpreted otherwise.’
If Internet messages are treated as elements of
offense as stated in the indictment, this becomes a
speech threat case in the context of the
Iraq war. The messages contain strong
political opposition to the policies of
President George W Bush and his execu-
tive team and there are a few crude words
in them. But the points raised in the US
Supreme Court judgment in Watts
becomes applicable here.
Brandenburg versus Ohio, 395 US
444 (1969)
Speaking at a Ku Klux Klan rally at
which a large wooden cross was burned
and some people present carried firearms,
Brandenburg attacked both African
Americans and Jews. He was convicted
under Ohio’s criminal syndicalism
statute, both for advocating the duty,
necessity, or propriety of crime, sabotage,
violence, or unlawful methods of terror-
ism as a means of accomplishing industri-
al or political reform, and for voluntarily
assembling with any society, group, or
assemblage of persons formed to teach or
advocate the doctrines of criminal syndi-
calism.
However, the US Supreme Court acquitted him, ruling,
‘ The constitutional guaranties of free speech and free press do
not permit a state to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of
force or of law violation, except where such advocacy is direct-
ed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is
likely to incite or produce such action.’
It can be seen that the US Supreme Court held in
Brandenburg that the First Amendment protects advocacy of
the use of the force or of law violation, except where such
advocacy is directed to inciting or producing ‘imminent law-
less action’ and is likely to incite or produce such action. This
position in law remains as it has not been changed by any
subsequent decision of the US Supreme Court.
A father who won’t give up
TORAL VARIA
Dr B K Subbarao has himself had a hard time in the US. He came
over on an emergency visa on June 25, 2006 to attend his son’s trial,
but that was postponed to June 26, 2007. Subbarao applied for an
extension of his stay, but it was denied.
In August 2007, Subbarao’s passport was confiscated. He was told
that it would be returned if he voluntarily left the country, although
that would mean that he could not return to the US for 10 years. He
was held in three different jails and released after three days.
President George W Bush greets troops at Camp Victory in Baghdad, Iraq, December 14, 2008
KEVIN LAMARQUE /REU TERS
threat cases in the US. Therefore, going by the judgment of
the Supreme Court in Brandenburg the Internet messages in
the Vikram Buddhi case are protected speech under the First
Amendment of the US Constitution. The trial judge abused
his discretion and erred seriously when ignoring the binding
judgments of the US Supreme Court.
There is also the relevant issue that the messages may have
come through an IP assigned to the computer of another
graduate student at Purdue University, though there is no
conclusive evidence about the origin of those messages.
Sami Omar Al-Hussayen Case
United States versus Al-Hussayen, No CR03-048-C-EJL
(D Idaho June 10, 2004) was the first Internet terrorism case
in the United States under the Patriot Act. It resulted in Al-
Hussayen’s acquittal in 2007.
Sami Omar Al-Hussayen, a Saudi Arabian computer sci-
ence doctoral student at the University of Idaho, developed
and maintained content for more than 15 extremist Islamic
Web sites and Internet chat rooms ‘which contained materi-
als designed and intended to recruit mujahideen and raise
funds for violent jihad.’
He also posted more violent messages compared to the
mere abstract violence advocated to the people of Iraq on
moral grounds in the Internet postings that came up in
Vikram Buddhi’s case.
In the Al-Hussayen case, the US district judge instructed
the jury the government could legally punish only communi-
cation aimed at provoking immediate violence. The instruc-
tions of the judge to the jury in Al-Hussayen case included a
clear instruction: ‘You can pass along very killing-type infor-
mation as long as it doesn’t produce actions which are immi-
nent.’
If Judge Moody, who presided over the jury trial of Vikram
Buddhi, had instructed the jury in similar fashion,
they would have declared Vikram Buddhi not guilty.
But because the judge did not, Vikram was convicted,
in the process being unjustly denied the constitutional
rights guaranteed and protected by the First
Amendment (freedom of speech) and by the due
process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
I, Vikram Buddhi’s father, have written several let-
ters to you, Hillary Clinton, three successive US attor-
ney generals, Indian President Pratibha Patil, Indian
Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, Indian External
Affairs Minister S M Krishna and others, showing the
need to allow the law of the United States to prevail in
order to meet the ends of justice in Vikram’s case, but
to no avail so far.
Homeland Security and Vikram Buddhi
According to US Federal Prison Rules, Vikram com-
pleted his sentence of 58 months May 6,
and was released on that date. The same
day the Department of Homeland
Security picked him up and put him in
their jail. One does not know what has
been happening to Vikram after that.
What can be done now?
As President of the United States, I
request you to take the following steps:
; Instruct the Department of Justice to
allow bail to Vikram Buddhi on personal
bond, and let him file an appeal against
his conviction and sentence before US
Appeals Court, Seventh Circuit, Chicago,
and, if required, the Supreme Court of the
United States.
;During the bond period, grant
Vikram Buddhi a work permit to earn his
livelihood since he is a qualified person
capable of sustaining himself. He can also
render some social service.
; Given that Vikram Buddhi has a legal
right to file an appeal and establish his
innocence, he should be afforded a fair
opportunity to secure justice under US law.
; Instruct the authorities to permit Vikram Buddhi’s par-
ents to assist him in his appeal process, the way the Iranian
authorities permitted Roxana Saberi’s parents to help her
have her life and liberty restored.
Captain (retired) Dr B K Subbarao is a former Indian Navy
officer and has a PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay in nuclear technology. He is an advocate in the
Supreme Court of India. You can contact him at
bksubbarao@gmail.com
