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American Library Association
For Immediate  Release
July 30, 2004

Statement from ALA President-Elect Michael  Gorman on the
destruction of Department of Justice documents

CHICAGO -- The following statement has been issued by President-Elect 
Michael Gorman, representing President Carol Brey-Casiano, who is
currently 
in Guatemala representing the Association:

Last week, the American Library Association learned that the Department of 
Justice asked the Government Printing Office Superintendent of Documents
to 
instruct depository libraries to destroy five publications the Department 
has deemed not "appropriate for external use." The Department of Justice 
has called for these five public documents, two of which are texts of 
federal statutes, to be removed from depository libraries and destroyed, 
making their content available only to those with access to a law office
or 
law library.

The topics addressed in the named documents include information on how 
citizens can retrieve items that may have been confiscated by the 
government during an investigation. The documents to be removed and 
destroyed include: Civil and Criminal Forfeiture Procedure; Select
Criminal 
Forfeiture Forms; Select Federal Asset Forfeiture Statutes; Asset 
forfeiture and money laundering resource directory; and Civil Asset 
Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000 (CAFRA).

ALA has submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the 
withdrawn materials in order to obtain an official response from the 
Department of Justice regarding this unusual action, and why the
Department 
has requested that documents that have been available to the public for as 
long as four years be removed from depository library collections. ALA is 
committed to ensuring that public documents remain available to the public 
and will do its best to bring about a satisfactory resolution of this
matter.

Librarians should note that, according to policy 72, written authorization 
from the Superintendent of Documents is required to remove any documents. 
To this date no such written authorization in hard copy has been issued.

AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION

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�2004 American Library Association. Copyright Statement