In the panic that was the first year after September 11th, 2001, a lot of really, REALLY questionable pieces of legislation were passed. Most notably among them is the infamous Patriot Act. The Patriot Act was “designed” to extend the powers of local and federal law enforcement agents to better combat the threat of terrorism.
In practice however, the Patriot Act seems to just shred basic Constitutional Rights of US citizens. At face value that’s exactly what this is, upon returning from this year’s Toronto Fighting Game Championships XII (T12 for short); tournament mainstay, Sp00ky had his laptop and video equipment detained by Department of Homeland Security without a reason given. As noted in his video above, the DHS agents simply cited a part in the Patriot Act that makes it legal and within the agents’ discretion to detain or confiscate equipment for purposes of their investigation.
The good news is that Team Sp00ky will continue to stream upcoming tournaments even though Sp00ky will be taking some time off. We’ve reached out to Team Sp00ky for comment but had not heard back as of this writing. We’ll be keeping an eye on this one.
