Smashy
09-13-2008, 11:19
CHICAGO - David Boim was standing at a bus stop in a West Bank town near Jerusalem 12 years ago when terrorists opened fire, fatally shooting the 17-year-old American teenager.
A lawsuit filed by his parents has been dragging through the courts for eight years as attorneys argue the central issue: who must pay damages.
A federal appeals court is still trying to come up with the answer.
Last December, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a lower court's order requiring several U.S.-based Islamic groups to pay $156 million to Boim's family - who claim money the groups gave to Palestinian charities ultimately helped fund terrorism.
But now the appeals court is second-guessing itself and revisiting the emotionally charged case, the first filed under a 1991 law allowing American victims of international terrorism to recover triple damages.
During an extraordinary "en banc" hearing before all 10 sitting judges last week, the case came in for a fresh airing. How much longer the case will go on is anyone's guess.
"It's been an ordeal," says Matthew J. Piers, an attorney for Muhammad Salah, the lone individual sued for damages by Joyce and Stanley Boim.
The Boims also are suing the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development; the American Muslim Society, also known as the Islamic Association for Palestine; and the Quranic Literacy Institute, a group based in suburban Chicago that translates Islamic texts.
The Boims say money Salah and the organizations gave to Palestinian charities on the West Bank was not used solely for humanitarian purposes. They say some of it bankrolled terrorism and thus paid for the teenager's murder - even if it didn't buy the specific gun and bullets.
Salah, 54, who is finishing a 22-month federal prison sentence for lying on documents in the Boim case, once was employed by the Quranic Literacy Institute. He is a U.S. citizen who grew up in a West Bank refugee camp and spent 4 1/2 years in Israeli prisons in the 1990s after police found $90,000 in cash allegedly destined for Hamas in his East Jerusalem hotel room.
But Piers told the appellate judges last week that any money Salah gave the terrorist group happened so long ago that there could be no relationship to David Boim's May 1996 killing.
"There is no evidence that the defendant did anything that contributed to or caused the tragic death of David Boim," Piers told the court.
Holy Land Foundation attorney John W. Boyd of Albuquerque, N.M., says the group even had a rule: none of its humanitarian funds were to go to Hamas, which, besides engaging in armed violence, runs schools and clinics.
But he told the appeals judges that such distinctions got swept aside in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks when the government designated the foundation a terrorist organization and froze its assets.
"When these assumptions of guilt merge with the profound human sympathy we all feel for a family such as the Boims - who lost their son to terrorism - the prejudice against the HLF is enormous, as is the desire to find some justice for the Boims, whatever it takes," Boyd wrote.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlander Keys in 2004 found the foundation, the American Muslim Society and Salah liable. A jury added Quranic Literacy Institute to the list and ordered all of the defendants to pay a total of $52 million in damages.
Keys tripled the amount to $156 million.
But a three-judge appeals panel ruled that the Boims had failed to show a tight enough link between the charitable contributions and the death of their son, and threw out the $156 million order.
Judges who are now taking another look say they wonder what evidence it would take to connect the contributions with the murder.
"I'm trying to get a handle on what the elements are," Judge Ann Claire Williams said. Some judges suggested that unless the standard of proof were high, charities such as the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders could get in trouble for providing medical aid in Third World countries.
But Boim attorney Nathan Lewin dismissed such qualms, saying his side had already presented everything it needs to prove its case, and scoffed at the notion that Islamic charities on the West Bank that received donations from the defendants were anything like the Red Cross.
In an impassioned, arm-waving presentation, Lewin said many such charities were "known fronts for Hamas, known supporters of Hamas."
"All that needs to be shown is that it's more likely than not that these defendants knew that the recipient group was a Hamas-related organization," Lewin said.
Judge Richard A. Posner sharply questioned Boyd after the defense attorney said that the Holy Land Foundation had strictly refrained from donating to Hamas.
Posner said that the foundation might not escape responsibility if it had reason to believe that the West Bank charities it gave money to had close ties with Hamas.
"You should know the consequences of what you're doing," he said.
If the appeals court lets the decision to throw out the damages stand, the matter could be sent back to the U.S. District Court, where the Boim attorneys would get another chance to prove their case. If the appeals panel upholds the lower court's monetary judgment, the case could end up before the Supreme Court.
Both parties say it is too soon to speculate.
How soon the appeals court will reach a decision is also unclear. But both sides are accustomed to waiting.
http://kai03.qwest.com/WindowsLive/Media/News/NewsDetail/National/US_court_reviews_ruling_in_teens_terrorism_death.aspx?id=D935N5O80@news.ap.org&client=landingpage&qid=62065212BDEAD58FA035F3E7FFFFFFFF
A lawsuit filed by his parents has been dragging through the courts for eight years as attorneys argue the central issue: who must pay damages.
A federal appeals court is still trying to come up with the answer.
Last December, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a lower court's order requiring several U.S.-based Islamic groups to pay $156 million to Boim's family - who claim money the groups gave to Palestinian charities ultimately helped fund terrorism.
But now the appeals court is second-guessing itself and revisiting the emotionally charged case, the first filed under a 1991 law allowing American victims of international terrorism to recover triple damages.
During an extraordinary "en banc" hearing before all 10 sitting judges last week, the case came in for a fresh airing. How much longer the case will go on is anyone's guess.
"It's been an ordeal," says Matthew J. Piers, an attorney for Muhammad Salah, the lone individual sued for damages by Joyce and Stanley Boim.
The Boims also are suing the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development; the American Muslim Society, also known as the Islamic Association for Palestine; and the Quranic Literacy Institute, a group based in suburban Chicago that translates Islamic texts.
The Boims say money Salah and the organizations gave to Palestinian charities on the West Bank was not used solely for humanitarian purposes. They say some of it bankrolled terrorism and thus paid for the teenager's murder - even if it didn't buy the specific gun and bullets.
Salah, 54, who is finishing a 22-month federal prison sentence for lying on documents in the Boim case, once was employed by the Quranic Literacy Institute. He is a U.S. citizen who grew up in a West Bank refugee camp and spent 4 1/2 years in Israeli prisons in the 1990s after police found $90,000 in cash allegedly destined for Hamas in his East Jerusalem hotel room.
But Piers told the appellate judges last week that any money Salah gave the terrorist group happened so long ago that there could be no relationship to David Boim's May 1996 killing.
"There is no evidence that the defendant did anything that contributed to or caused the tragic death of David Boim," Piers told the court.
Holy Land Foundation attorney John W. Boyd of Albuquerque, N.M., says the group even had a rule: none of its humanitarian funds were to go to Hamas, which, besides engaging in armed violence, runs schools and clinics.
But he told the appeals judges that such distinctions got swept aside in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks when the government designated the foundation a terrorist organization and froze its assets.
"When these assumptions of guilt merge with the profound human sympathy we all feel for a family such as the Boims - who lost their son to terrorism - the prejudice against the HLF is enormous, as is the desire to find some justice for the Boims, whatever it takes," Boyd wrote.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlander Keys in 2004 found the foundation, the American Muslim Society and Salah liable. A jury added Quranic Literacy Institute to the list and ordered all of the defendants to pay a total of $52 million in damages.
Keys tripled the amount to $156 million.
But a three-judge appeals panel ruled that the Boims had failed to show a tight enough link between the charitable contributions and the death of their son, and threw out the $156 million order.
Judges who are now taking another look say they wonder what evidence it would take to connect the contributions with the murder.
"I'm trying to get a handle on what the elements are," Judge Ann Claire Williams said. Some judges suggested that unless the standard of proof were high, charities such as the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders could get in trouble for providing medical aid in Third World countries.
But Boim attorney Nathan Lewin dismissed such qualms, saying his side had already presented everything it needs to prove its case, and scoffed at the notion that Islamic charities on the West Bank that received donations from the defendants were anything like the Red Cross.
In an impassioned, arm-waving presentation, Lewin said many such charities were "known fronts for Hamas, known supporters of Hamas."
"All that needs to be shown is that it's more likely than not that these defendants knew that the recipient group was a Hamas-related organization," Lewin said.
Judge Richard A. Posner sharply questioned Boyd after the defense attorney said that the Holy Land Foundation had strictly refrained from donating to Hamas.
Posner said that the foundation might not escape responsibility if it had reason to believe that the West Bank charities it gave money to had close ties with Hamas.
"You should know the consequences of what you're doing," he said.
If the appeals court lets the decision to throw out the damages stand, the matter could be sent back to the U.S. District Court, where the Boim attorneys would get another chance to prove their case. If the appeals panel upholds the lower court's monetary judgment, the case could end up before the Supreme Court.
Both parties say it is too soon to speculate.
How soon the appeals court will reach a decision is also unclear. But both sides are accustomed to waiting.
http://kai03.qwest.com/WindowsLive/Media/News/NewsDetail/National/US_court_reviews_ruling_in_teens_terrorism_death.aspx?id=D935N5O80@news.ap.org&client=landingpage&qid=62065212BDEAD58FA035F3E7FFFFFFFF