Appeals Court Reminds Law Enforcement That ‘No-Fly’ Doesn’t Mean ‘No Drive’

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

The no-fly" list has many problems. Pretty much any fed can nominate" someone for the list. Pretty much everyone on the list has almost zero chance of getting off it other than by filing a lawsuit. And even though the government has been forced by court decisions to offer a venue for challenges, the federal government is still under no obligation to tell people why they've been placed on the list, much less promise to never put them back on it again.

When people have been removed (almost exclusively following lawsuits), they're simply told they've been removed. The only way to find out if they've been reinstated is to buy a ticket to ride only to have it denied after they've already spent their money and arrived at the airport.

Then there's the cross-pollination of federal law enforcement databases, which turns people on the no fly" list into suspected terrorists, even if there's nothing in the database that supports this implication or any cop's corresponding inference.

As unjust as this all is, at least there are some limits. Well, maybe one. And maybe one that only applies to this specific incident. But, there's at least one limit and it's spelled out by this decision [PDF] handed down by the Eleventh Circuit Appeals Court. And that limitation is this: you can't stop someone from driving just because they're not allowed to board a plane. (h/t FourthAmendment.com)

Here's how this all went down in Georgia, leading to this federal lawsuit:

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