An interesting post from Prof. Howard Friedman (Religion Clause) on a recent decision:
In Council on American-Islamic Relations v. Gaubatz, (D DC, Nov. 3, 2009), the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted a temporary restraining order to CAIR to prevent the use by defendants of various documents and e-mails that were surreptitously taken from CAIR’s offices. Defendant Paul Gabautz publishes a blog devoted to “exposing Islamic terrorist operations in America.” A number of postings on the blog accuse CAIR, a Muslim advocacy group, of being a front for the Muslim Brotherhood and of supporting Al Qaeda. Paul Gabautz implemented a plan to get his son, Chris, hired as an intern at CAIR under an assumed name. Chris copied or removed various documents and recorded various meetings and conversations at CAIR. Many of the materials were either posted on Paul’s blog, or included in a book co-authored by Paul that was published last month titled Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That’s Conspiring to Islamize America. Among the blog postings were lists of CAIR employees and donors (with personal contact information). The TRO, along with its broader bans, specifically ordered removal of these and return of the lists to CAIR. Here is an account of the decision and background on it from World Net Daily that published Gaubautz’s book and is defending the Gaubautz’s in the lawsuit.
I haven’t read the decision myself yet, but I thought the item was worth passing along; to see the underlying documents, go to the Religion Clause post for links.