Shipley said that the spying program did not extend beyond groups opposed to the death penalty, although he acknowledged that police occasionally monitored other people.
He said some information about activists gathered outside the 14-month period beginning in 2005 was triggered by specific incidents and was not part of the more thorough death-penalty operation.
"It is intelligence information and actions that are in response to proposed events or actions that led to concern on the part of police for issues of public safety," Shipley said.
For example, an undercover trooper attended one meeting of Frederick Progressive Action Coalition in 2005 and reported that no criminal activity was planned, he said. Earlier, a member of that group had been found at a biotechnology conference wearing a stolen hotel employee's uniform, Shipley said.
"That prompted concern about future action," he said. "This is not spying, as the ACLU would have people believe. This is police in this situation acting on valid law enforcement concern and working to protect the public safety."
However, Rocah pointed out that troopers created files on the two members of the Fredrick group before the hotel incident, and thus the episode could not have served as the basis of the infiltration.
"It's patent nonsense, contradicted by the facts in their own files," he said.
Rocah and other officials called on O'Malley to do more to ensure these documents are released.
O'Malley spokesman Rick Abbruzzese said the governor has worked with state police to allow people to access records with counsel present but referred other questions to state police.
A dozen of the 53 spying subjects called for more transparency at a news conference yesterday.
"I challenge the state to come clean on what they actually have on us," said Nadine Bloch, a Takoma Park resident who, according to her file, creates giant puppets for protests.
Members of national groups that were included on the list said they were surprised because they have never attended events in this state.
"I've never been to Maryland. I'm not an anarchist or an environmental extremist," Nancy Kricorian, a coordinator for the New York office of Code Pink, an organization of women advocating for peace, said in a telephone interview.
