The ruling by Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York came in a motion by the American Civil Liberties Union that the intelligence agency be held in contempt. Although he ruled against the ACLU motion, the judge applauded the efforts of the ACLU’s legal team for prompting the disclosure of thousands of documents related to detainee treatment.

“What you and your colleagues have done in getting this story to the American public has been extraordinary,” Hellerstein said.

In a rare move, Hellerstein sanctioned the CIA by ordering it to pay attorneys fees for the ACLU.

But he stopped short of holding the spy agency in contempt for the destruction of interrogation tapes.

“Bottom line, we’re in a dangerous world. We need our spies. We also need surveillance,” Hellerstein said.

The tapes were made in 2002 and showed the interrogations of two suspected al Qaeda leaders — Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. According to former CIA officer John Kiriakou, some of the videos showed controversial interrogation techniques including waterboarding, which simulates drowning.

Government officials have said the tapes were destroyed in November 2005 at the orders of Jose Rodriguez, then head of the CIA’s National Clandestine Service (NCS), with the approval of NCS lawyers. Then-CIA Director Mike Hayden wrote in a December 2007 staff memo saying the tapes were made as “an internal check” on the CIA’s use of harsh interrogation techniques and the decision to destroy them was made “only after it was determined they were no longer of intelligence value and relevant to any internal, legislative or judicial inquires.”

The tapes had been part of a massive Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request from the ACLU. In 2007, the ACLU moved for contempt and sanctions against the CIA but the case was deferred pending a criminal investigation by a special prosecutor.

The ACLU renewed its motion in February arguing that “high-level CIA officials knowingly flouted their obligations under FOIA and this Court’s orders — apparently with the specific intent of evading the public accountability that FOIA was enacted to ensure,” according to the plaintiff’s lawsuit.

On Monday, ACLU lawyer Lawrence S. Lustberg was back in federal court demanding that the CIA and Rodriguez be held in contempt and sanctioned in the form of attorney’s fees for “brazenly violating” the judge’s orders.

“It’s the invocation of a remedy that has existed literally for centuries — that nobody is above the law,” Lustberg said.

“There has to be accountability in every level of government.”

Assistant U.S. Attorney Ausa Tara LaMorte told the court that the CIA has turned over documents related to the case and has implemented new protocol regarding the destruction of records. Beyond the new policies within the agency, LaMorte said, the CIA has offered to pay the plaintiff’s attorney’s fees. The contempt citation, LaMorte argued, was unwarranted.

“Every single argument the plaintiffs have made show that they want to exact retribution from the CIA,” said LaMorte.

With Hellerstein’s ruling Monday, details of CIA payment for the ACLU legal fees still have to be worked out.

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Mary Bavis has been told she can seek millions in damages for the ‘pain and suffering’ her 31-year-old son Mark endured after hijackers took over his flight.

A judge has ruled that the 21 minutes United Airlines flight 175 was on a collision course with the World Trade Centre can be taken into consideration in a wrongful death lawsuit.

The terror suffered by Mr Bavis and the other 65 passengers were documented in frantic calls made from the doomed flight.

Passenger Peter Hanson managed to get through to his father, telling him, ‘It’s getting bad, Dad. A stewardess was stabbed.

‘They seem to have knives and mace. They said they have a bomb. It’s getting very bad on the plane. Passengers are throwing up and getting sick. The plane is making jerky movements.

‘I don’t think the pilot is flying the plane. I think we are going down. I think they intend to go to Chicago or someplace and fly into a building. Don’t worry, Dad. If it happens, it’ll be very fast…Oh, my God… oh my God, oh my God.’

Minutes later, the Boeing 767 slammed into the south tower of the World Trade Centre, the second of the hijacked planes used in the suicide mission.

The Bavis family, who are suing United Airlines, want damages not only for Mark’s death but also for the last terrifying minutes of his life.

They claim United Airlines and security firm Huntleigh USA were negligent in allowing the Al Qaeda hijackers on to the flight from Boston’s Logan Airport.

The Bavis family, of Boston, Massachusetts, are the only family out of the 3,000 victims who have refused to accept a settlement.

Thousands of victims in the terror attack have shared over $7bn in compensation. More than 100 families who filed lawsuits settled for $500m.

The Bavis family’s lawsuit has been working through the court for the last decade.

In the latest ruling, Judge Alvin K Hellerstein said he would allow Mrs Bavis to seek damages for suffering on the doomed flight.

After listening to arguments from family lawyers and those for United Airlines, he said he was inclined to allow the jury to come up with ‘a figure for pain and suffering through the entire 21-minute period’.

‘My thinking is tending toward allowing terror damages,’ Judge Hellerstein told Manhattan Federal District Court.

The hearing was attended by Mark Bavis’s brothers, Patrick and his identical twin Michael.

He said afterwards: ‘This is my brother’s voice, this trial.’

Lawyers for United Airlines have tried to have the case dismissed, saying that under Massachusetts law, damages can only be paid for ‘conscious suffering resulting from the same injury’.

They argued that Mr Bavis was not injured prior to the hijacked jet crashing.

The wrongful death lawsuit is due to be heard in November.

The post 9/11 Mother Seeks Damages for Son's Terror on United 175 appeared first on 9/11 Truth News.

The agency is one of the most prominent issuers in the $2.9 trillion municipal market. Its finances have been strained by the costly rebuilding of the World Trade Center complex.

The lawsuit centers on 7 World Trade Center, which was built just north of the World Trade Center site, above an existing Con Edison base station, the appeals court decision said.

Consolidated Edison Inc and its insurers had sued the Port Authority, owner of 7 World Trade Center, after the building collapsed in a maelstrom of fire on the afternoon of the September 11, 2001, attacks.

The order by a three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals partially overturned a decision by Manhattan federal court Judge Alvin Hellerstein, who has been handling much of the litigation following the deadly air attacks.

Hellerstein had granted summary judgment to the Port Authority, finding that under the terms of its lease to Con Edison, it could not be held responsible for the tower’s speedy destruction.

“The district court interpreted the lease to preclude Con Edison from maintaining an action against Port Authority based on Port Authority’s negligence in connection with construction or maintenance of 7WTC,” Circuit Judges Roger Miner, Pierre Leval and Richard Wesley wrote. “This was error.”

In a September 2002 lawsuit, Con Edison claimed the Port Authority had improperly allowed its tenants to place diesel fuel tanks used for back-up power, and that the burning tanks had accelerated the collapse of the building late in the afternoon of September 11.

Con Edison also claimed in its lawsuit that the Port Authority could be found negligent in the tower’s design and construction.

“In short, we conclude it was error to read the parties’ lease as precluding claims by Con Edison against Port Authority premised on Port Authority’s negligence in connection with the construction of 7WTC or the installation of the diesel fuel tanks in the building,” the appeals court order said.

But the order upholds the lower court judge on the more general negligence claim, saying Con Edison had not properly notified the Port Authority of its intention to sue on those grounds.

“Claims of negligent design and construction of 7WTC, of which Port Authority was not reasonably notified by the June 2002 Notice, must be dismissed,” the decision said.

In 2006, the same address was the scene of a newly completed 42-story tower, the first new building in the reconstruction of the World Trade Center complex.

The case is Aegis Insurance Services, Inc as subrogee for Consolidated Edison Co. of New York et al v The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 09-3603.

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One sticking point in the agreement has been cancer cases that are expected to be assigned relatively low settlement amounts because they cannot be directly linked to exposure to contaminants at ground zero.

“If you ask me what’s wrong with the settlement, it’s cancer,” Judge Hellerstein acknowledged.

But he urged the plaintiffs to accept the settlement as the best possible alternative. “There’s no way the remedy will equal your pain,” he said.

[Source]

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