Trying to get help from ACLU

TO: ACLU – NC (American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California)

P: (415) 621-2493, F: (415) 255-1478

FROM: Bailin (Barry) Ma,

530 El Invierno Drive,

Gilroy, CA 95020

Phone: (408) 846-1915,

Email: mblzzy@yahoo.com

DATE: July 5, 2004

RE: What agency has been harassing me for years?

Dear Sirs,

Please send me a copy of “USING THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT, a Step-by-Step Guide”. The reason I need the publication is that I have been followed and harassed by an unknown government agency for more than 10 years.

• I am a U.S. citizen.
• I have no crime record either in the U.S. or in China.
• I have never been stopped and interrogated by any law enforcement agency, except for traffic tickets.
• I have never received any accusation of misconducts from any authority and individuals – that is a better record than Bill Clinton and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

I don’t know exactly the starting time for FBI to label me as a dangerous guy who must be closely watched 24/7/365. In retrospect, it could have begun 10 years ago. The situation was getting worse and worse since I moved to California from Chicago in 1997.

In recent five years, almost every time I opened the front door of my house as I stepped out without driving, an SUV or a car would be quickly approaching me. When I was doing garden work in front yard or sitting on front porch, there would be many SUVs or cars passing by back and forth to threaten me. When I go out to get mail from mail box, was standing at the curb, a car quickly and closely passed by behind me to scare me. That happened at least five times until I gave up going outside to get mail. When I was mowing front yard or repair sprinkles, they sent a car or two parking on road to monitor me.

One day I was cleaning the drive way, a housewife shouted loudly toward me from her front yard, obliquely across the street four houses a way, “Damn it! Go back home! Don’t stay outside!” by pretending to yell at her kids. She repeated many times until I got back to my house.

I am a Christian. After I moved to Bay Area in 1997, I went to a Chinese Christian church. Before long the church hired a security guard who would be always watching me in distance during the worship and escorting me out after the worship. When I went to some big Christian assemblies at San Jose city, they sent somebody either standing by me or approaching me with detestation stare. …I finally gave up going to church and any public events.

In my working place, they treated me more severely. …When I went to man’s room, they sent two persons standing by me on each side, staring at me with abhorrence stare as I was urinating. To avoid them, I went to a toilet compartment. They slammed the doors of two next compartments very hard again and again to scare me. When I walked along the corridor in the company, somebody would suddenly appear from another corridor and nearly collide with me. …I never saw those persons in the company before …. I finally lost my job in 2002.. …

The pressure they imposed on me has been fluctuating. If I do not look soften enough to them, they would raise the pressure further. I don’t know how to satisfy them. For example, if my wife and I complained in our bedroom a few words about my situation. They thought we had violated their rules and would raise the pressure. In the toughest days, I was driving on highway 101 one day, they sent a car driving in the next lane suddenly changed lane toward me to nearly hit my car. In direct response to the sudden attack without thinking, my car thrust over two lanes toward the weigh station area (for big trucks). I was scared a lot and could only exit the highway to local streets with trembling hands. I stayed home in fear all the time having no dare to go out, that is, a virtual home confinement they wanted.

When I stayed in a hotel of Tokyo in 1997 in a flight from Chicago to Hong Kong via Tokyo for attending my mother’s funeral ceremony in China, I found myself being followed and watched in the hotel. When I went to China to visit my father in 2002 after I lost my job, the situation remained unchanged. I found a police car always passing through just in front of me every morning when I was about to cross the street after morning exercise.

I am proud of becoming a citizen of USA. That is my personal selection because I love this great country. I used to be an associate professor of a university in China. I have Ph. D. in Electrical Engineering. I lived at Shenzhen, a wealth city in the vicinity of Hong Kong, with my wife and daughter. I would have had good personal future in China. Why I decided to stay in the U.S. and refuse going back to China in 1989 when I was already at age of 46? -- I hate Communism and Communist Party. However, I found myself in the same situation as “Sileifenzi” in China (“the four kinds of elements” – landlord, rich peasants, counterrevolutionaries, and bad elements). My situation is even worse; no government agency in the U.S. has declared I am a bad guy, dangerous to the public, as Chinese Communist Party did to “Sileifenzi” during Mao’s era.

The above is only a long story short.

You have successfully represented two ladies who had been categorized by government to “No Fly” list.

The verdicts made by Supreme Court on 6/28/2004 encouraged me to present my case to you. The justices of Supreme Court said that finding the right balance between individual liberty and the national security is a job for courts, not for any other government agencies.

Please help me locate the government agency I may go to for an explanation.

Sincerely yours,

Bailin Ma