The legal aftermath of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing incident could serve as a model for establishing formal relationships with nations previously associated with terrorism, according to James Kreindler ... a specialist in aviation accident and terrorist litigation and featured speaker at the discussion, “Lessons from Lockerbie: Terrorism and International Law.” The discussion, which also included government professors Dean Lacy and Dirk Vandewalle, was held in the Haldeman Center on Tuesday [23 February].
The Lockerbie incident is the name given to the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland on Dec 21, 1988. The attack, orchestrated by Libyan terrorists, resulted in the death of 270 individuals, most of whom were Americans. The resulting litigation — in which Kreindler’s law firm sued the Government of Libya and Pan Am airlines on behalf of victims’ families — resulted in the elimination of foreign nations’ sovereign immunity in private US lawsuits and was the first case in which a small group of plaintiffs led the development of a foreign policy issue, according to Kreindler.
The incident drove the international community to work toward the development of concrete policies on how to deal with international terrorism, Vandewalle said in an interview with The Dartmouth.
“Increasingly there is the sense that people who perpetuate [sic] terrorist acts should be accountable,” Vandewalle said. “We should go after these terrorists financially, especially if linked to governments.” (...)
At the time, the victims’ families could not sue Libya because foreign nations were protected by sovereign immunity, Kreindler said.
In 1996, several of the victims’ families lobbied Congress to change the law to permit the victims of terrorism and their families to sue countries that sponsor terrorist attacks, according to Kreindler. Congress passed the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act in 1996, allowing the victims’ families to pursue their case against the Libyan government.
“The Libyans could never understand how 270 families could change the law in the United States,” Kreindler said.
Kreindler’s private firm, Kreindler & Kreindler LLP, represented the victims’ families, he said.
“We sued Libya, accusing them of the largest murder of Americans in history,” Kreindler said.
Setting a new precedent, the Justice Department agreed to allow a private firm to pursue litigation against the Libyan government, according to Kreindler. After two years of negotiation, Libya agreed to pay damages of $10 million per death to the victims’ families under several conditions. Libya was to be removed from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism, and UN sanctions against Libya were to be lifted.
In 2006, the US government prematurely removed Libya from the list of state sponsors of terrorism before Libya made its final payment, leaving Libya with no incentive to pay the remainder of the payment, Kreindler said. At that time, Libya was involved in 22 other miscellaneous private lawsuits in US courts.
The subsequent Libya Claims Resolution Act allowed Libya to pay money into a fund for the victims’ families in exchange for the termination of all cases against Libya in US courts, according to Kreindler. The victims’ families received their final payment in December 2008, 20 years after the bombing.
Kreindler expressed confidence that, like Libya, several other countries on the list of state sponsors of terrorism will seek a “clean slate” once removed from the list. He added that these countries will likely be eager to pay into a global fund in exchange for termination of all US litigation.
“This will be the prototype for formalizing relationships with countries such as Iran and Syria,” Kreindler said.
Kreindler received the 2009 Trial Lawyer of the Year award for his work on the bombing.
[From a report on the website of The Dartmouth.]
Mr Kreindler has much to answer for.
ReplyDeleteBy now he surely must know that Libya was nothing to do with Lockerbie.
Or he is an ignorant fool, and the chiefest benefactor against the American campaign against that country.
Hardly an ignorant fool, Charles!
ReplyDeleteJames P. Kreindler netted at least $300 million from the $2.7 billion paid out by Libya for a crime that the apartheid South African regime actually carried out.
Jim Kreindler is the 3rd generation of aviation crash lawyers. His dad, Lee S. Kreindler, extracted over $9 million from Pan Am's insurers for the death of one Lockerbie victim, on the basis that an unaccompanied suitcase from Malta had somehow blown up Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland.
The grandfather, Harry E. Kreindler founded the firm in 1950.
No one, especially in the USA seems to have the slightest sense of shame for their part in that perversity that is Pan Am 103, especially the lawyers.
ReplyDeleteIt's not much better when you turn to jobs the Libyans actually did.
The trial lawyers for the 7 US victims in the UTA case must have taken home a cool $2B between them. Step forward Mr Crowell and Mr Moring. For translating some 80 documents into execrable English missing out accented letters when they came to them, so the Jug's name became Bruguire, shorn its vital e-grave, the lawyers took the case papers of the UTA trial, a gift apparently of SOS-Attentats who had privileged access to them, some 80 docuemnts, discarded a few to do with the FBI (possibly sensitive things to do Lockerbie), printed out a State Department series of annual statements on global terrorism, which curiously omits mentioning Lockerbie as an act of US terrorism, attached document by a Mr NcNamara an ex State official, and ex-colleague of Bonnie Pugh, and took the moolah. Each lost American like was valued at $843M. How much did were the Iranians who lost there lives on IR-655 valued at $60K to $160K.
Talk about a world of winners and losers.
The Antiterrorism and effective death penalty Act" isn't really "International Law" at all. It simply removes Soveeign Immunity in US Courts for US victims of state sponsored terrorism and was essentially part of the campaign for regime change in Libya.
ReplyDeleteOf course nobody has ever been a victim of US state sponsored terrorism! (With due respect Charles I do not find it "curious" the State Department omits to mention Lockerbie as an example of US terrorism!)
When Nicaragua successfully brought the US mining of it's harbours to the World Court the ruling was ignored or seen as justification for the "reform" of the UN!
My favourite bit was that "this will be the prototype for formalizing relationship's with countries such as Iran and Syria" with the "terrorist" state paying into a fund in order to be removed from the State Department's "list".
Stafford Hospital, RBS bonuses, Lee Kreindler - why is the world like that?
Irony, Baz
ReplyDeleteIt isn't irony - it is just a mad world.
ReplyDelete"..these countries will likely be eager to pay into a global fund in exchange for termination of all US litigation. This will be the prototype for formalizing relationships with countries such as Iran and Syria”
ReplyDeleteThere's a technical term in law for this sort of arrangement - oh yes - 'protection racket'.
Allowing private citizens to proceed against foreign states in the certainly that there governments will aid such private actions, is an extension of traditional interstate relations.
ReplyDeleteIt is not allowed in this country or France for example.
I am not sue how much money the Libyans were required to pay after the UTA settlement, as it has not been made known, but it was surely less than the $843M/ life (sic) awarded for their citizens in default of a Libyan defence by a judge of the Eastern Federal Direct Circuit against the country, and some say as low as $20M/life. These figures are respectively 84.3 and 2 times the Lockerbie payout, themselves roughly between 62.5 and 166 times the payout per head for the lives of those killed on IR-655.
Does Mr Kreindler now consider his clients were swindled?
We are at the apogee of the power of the US financial/military/political system and countries like North Korea, Iran, Syria and Libya which do not regard themselves as pariahs, but simply as victims of an insensitive over-muscled international bully whose own actions are not above reproach whether towards themselves or other members of the international polity must be itching to see this self-appointed occupant of what Theodore Roosevelt admitted was a bully-pulpit pulled down a peg or two.
There is such a thing called hubris and the world does not wait on the meanderings of position of that tiny group of people who live out their lives in air-conditioned offices inside the Beltway, plotting and scheming mayhem.
Like Samson, the Americans may wish to bring the whole edifice of their delusional temple down about their ears, when they don't get their way any longer. I hope we take sensible to take measures to be outside that temple looking in and not the other way around.