Yesterday, a federal appeals court announced that it will hear the governmentâs appeal of an earlier ruling that allowed the ACLUâs lawsuit against Boeing subsidiary, Jeppesen DataPlan Inc., to go forward. In 2007, we sued Jeppesen for its role in the Bush administrationâs unlawful âextraordinary renditionâ program. Our lawsuit was filed on behalf of five men who were forcibly disappeared and then tortured in U.S.-run secret overseas prisons or by foreign intelligence agents.
Shortly after the lawsuit was filed, the Bush administration intervened, improperly asserting the âstate secretsâ privilege and asking the judge to have the case thrown out without considering any evidence in support of the mensâ case. Although the lower court upheld the governmentâs claims, , a three-judge panel (PDF) of the lawsuit. The panel held, contrary to the assertions of Obama administration lawyers, and as we had argued, that the âstate secretsâ privilege can only be invoked with respect to specific evidence, and not to dismiss the entire suit. , the Obama administration appealed the decision, and asked an âen bancâ panel of 11 judges to rehear the case, which the court announced yesterday that it will hear.
Ben Wizner, staff attorney with the ACLUâs National Security Project, and counsel in the case, stated:
âWe are disappointed by the courtâs decision to re-hear this case, but we hope and expect that the courtâs historic decision to allow the lawsuit to go forward will stand. The CIAâs rendition and torture program simply is not a âstate secret.â In fact, since the courtâs decision in April, the governmentâs sweeping secrecy claims have only gotten weaker, with the declassification of additional documents describing the CIAâs detention and interrogation practices. The Obama administrationâs embrace of overbroad secrecy claims has denied torture victims their day in court and shielded perpetrators from liability or accountability. We hope that the court will reaffirm the principle that victims of torture deserve a remedy, and that no one is above the law.â
The points out that, âOf the five plaintiffs, two are still imprisoned in Egypt and , and the other three were released without U.S. charges.â To date, no torture victim from the Bush-administrationâs âWar on Terrorâ has had his day in court.