You might have heard the story about Elliot Madison. He was a social worker at the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh, PA who was arrested on September 24 for using SMS and Twitter to track and report police movements to protesters in the area.

The Pennsylvania State Police didn’t consider this activity, and a hotel room filled with computers and police scanners to be legal given the context, but he was released on bail not long after the arrest.

On Thursday, October 1 , the situation escalated when the FBI spent 16 hours in a raid on Mason’s home in Queens, New York.  According to the motion submitted by Madison’s lawyer the FBI seized, “political writings, notes, political associates and ideas, materials protected by the attorney-client and social work priivileges [sic], as well as property belonging to other persons residing in the premises which have no connection to any pending or contemplated criminal investigation and which constitute the private property of such other persons.”Madison may describe himself as a political anarchist, but as a social worker for a psych-social rehabilitation program and the recipient of two masters degrees, he’s certainly not ignorant to the implications of holding and aiding others with his position.

He and his lawyer are arguing that the seizures, which included computers and cell phones, were a violation of his First Amendment rights. Other odd items seized include a poster of cat, magnets, flags, newspapers, book, drawings, an orange-colored bandana and a lot of external hard-drives, MP3 players and USB drives.  They did however have a few more interesting items, such as eleven gas masks, masks, test tubes and a slingshot.

The warrant for the search was issued on alleged violations of “federal rioting laws” while the charges for his arrest include “hindering apprehension or prosecution,” “criminal use of communication facility” and “possessing instruments of crime – criminal instruments generally.”

There were clearly illegal activities at work during the protest; windows were broken and protesters were seen fleeing from police. But it is not clear whether Madison’s communications specifically aided those activities.

For further information, the Electronic Frontier Foundation on Monday posted Madison’s Motion and the supporting Order to Show Cause.