Don't feel guilty, we arrested people for wearing certain clothes and had no more success
Quote of note:
"You're dealing with processes that take place in one's head," Mr. Donner said. "We can't arrest people for wearing certain clothes."
Dutch Try to Thwart Terror Without Being Overzealous
By CRAIG S. SMITH
AMSTERDAM, Nov. 18 - His telephone was tapped, his apartment was watched and many of his friends were already behind bars, so the Dutch authorities were not surprised by evidence that it was Mohamed Bouyeri, a Dutchman of Moroccan descent, who murdered the filmmaker Theo van Gogh in broad daylight one morning this month. Yet they had been powerless to stop the crime.
It is a problem faced by most European governments as radical Islam spreads across the Continent: how to arrest suspected militants before they act, without trampling on individual rights or risking charges of discrimination.
The government of the Netherlands has come under criticism for missing Mr. Bouyeri when Islamist death threats were made against Mr. van Gogh. But stopping him would have meant assessing guilt before the crime, Justice Minister Jan Piet Hein Donner said in an interview.
