Now for the last of the posts on Blue Notices (for a while, at least). In the last post, I discussed the fact that one of the purposes that a member country may provide in its application for an INTERPOL Blue Notice was the tracking of the subject’s movement. While a case is still in the investigative stages, a law enforcement agency may wish to trace the steps of a suspect, witness, or other person of interest in furtherance of its investigation.
Finding out that one is the subject of a Blue Notice is unlikely to be good news. The only person, at least that I am aware of, who was ever happy to be the subject of a Blue Notice was Paul Watson, the head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. He blogged about the Blue Notice in his name, which was issued based upon his anti-whaling activities in Japan, and rightly stated that “you can’t buy this kind of recognition.” Take note, anti-establishment activists: Blue Notice = free publicity.
Now, back to the question at hand: is traveling advisable for the subject of a Blue Notice? Of course, the common sense answer is, if you don’t want your movements to be traced, don’t travel. However, the chances are good that most people who are the subjects of Blue Notices are unaware of the existence of the Notices. While a small percentage of Notices are available to the public on INTERPOL’s website, most Notices are unpublished and available only to law enforcement upon authorized request.
People who are unsure of whether they are the subjects of Blue Notices, or the reasons that they are the subjects of Blue Notices, may wish to obtain legal assistance to institute an effort to determine those answers.
As always, comments and thoughts are welcomed.