Filed May 14, 2004
Citing Letelier, 488 F.Supp. 665 and Liu, 892 F.2d 1419, the court reasoned: “As 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a)(5) already provides jurisdiction over state-sponsored terrorist acts in the United States, the state-sponsored terrorism exception would be redundant if it were held to apply only within the United States.” Flatow, 999 F.Supp. at 15 (emphasis added; citations omitted). See also Price v. Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriaya, 294 F.3d 82, 88 (D.C. Cir. 2002) (“Under the original FSIA, therefore, terrorism, torture, and hostage-taking committed abroad were immunized forms of state activity.”)
Filed February 2, 2007
“Accordingly, the statute of limitations for the plaintiffs’ claims must be tolled to begin when the defendants were stripped of their immunity with the 1996 enactment of 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a)(7).” Collett, 362 F. Supp. 2d at 242; Wyatt, 398 F. Supp. 2d at 145; Peterson, 264 F. Supp. 2d at 60 ; Flatow, 999 F. Supp. at 23. Relying on settled precedent in this Circuit, the Plaintiffs filed suit on April 21, 2006, within ten years of the date that Congress passed the state-sponsored terrorism exception, stripping the Libyan Defendants of their immunity.
Filed May 15, 2006
Kadic, 70 F.3d at 250; accord, Filartiga v. Pena-Irala, 630 F.2d 876, 889 (2d Cir. 1980). See also, Linder, 963 F.2d at 337 (only “acts of legitimate warfare” are exempt from liability [under] Underhill); Sarei v. Rio Tinto Plc, 221 F. Supp. 2d 1116, 1189 (C.D. Cal. 2002) (9th Cir., argued June 23, 2005) (war crimes cannot be deemed official acts of state because they are not legitimate acts of warfare); Flatow, 999 F. Supp. at 24 (“acts of international terrorism are not valid acts of state of the type which bar consideration”); Biton II, 412 F. Supp. 2d at 9 (“children are not the proper targets of war”). It “would be a rare case in which the act of state doctrine precluded suit under” the ATS.
Filed August 10, 2015
To do so, the jury needs to evaluate the evidence of what actually occurred and determine whether and to what extent the terrorist attacks “increase the magnitude of the injury.” Case 1:06-cv-01623-BMC-VVP Document 1076 Filed 08/10/15 Page 7 of 11 PageID #: 82139 8 Flatow, 999 F. Supp. at 30. Obviously, FRE 402 and 403 recognize a spectrum of evidence and call upon courts to weigh relevance against potential prejudice.
Filed January 26, 2010
29-31. 24 Prior to Congress specifically addressing extrajudicial killings by foreign states in FSIA § 1605(a)(7), the courts in Letelier v. Republic of Chile, 488 F. Supp. 665, 671-74 (D.D.C. 1980), and Liu v. Republic of China, 892 F.2d 1419, 1425-26 (9th Cir. 1989), held that FSIA § 1605(a)(5) provided jurisdiction for such acts in the U. S. See also Flatow v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 999 F. Supp. 1, 15 (D.D.C. 1998) (discussing Liu and Letelier). Case 1:09-mc-00466-RWR-AK Document 37 Filed 01/26/10 Page 29 of 36 22 Plaintiff cannot circumvent trademark law by falling back on TRIA.
Filed December 20, 2007
28 U.S.C. § 1605. The FSIA enumerates a number of specific exceptions to sovereign immunity, including cases “in which money damages are sought against a foreign state for personal injury or death that was caused by an act of torture, extrajudicial killing, aircraft sabotage, hostage taking, or the provision of material support or resources (as defined in section 2339A of title 18) for such an act if such act or provision of material support is engaged in by an official, employee, or agent of such foreign state while acting within the scope of his or her office, employment, or agency, except that the court shall decline to hear a claim under this paragraph.” 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a)(7). After passage of § 16605 (a)(7), the court held, in Flatow v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 999 F. Supp. 1 (D.D.C. 1998), that the waiver of sovereign immunity did not itself create a cause of action. Subsequently, Congress passed the “Flatow Amendment” (28 U.S.C.A.§ 1605 (a)(7) Note), to create a federal statutory cause of action for such cases.
Filed December 7, 2007
Indeed, but for two recent decisions from Judges Kennedy and Kessler of this Court, every district judge of this Court that has addressed the statute of limitations question under the FSIA, has held that the statute allows plaintiffs ten years from the date the FSIA terrorism amendments were enacted to bring their claims. See, e.g., Flatow, 999 F. Supp. at 23 (Lamberth, J.) (holding that “as a matter of law, . . . the earliest date for the statute of limitations to expire for any action brought pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a)(7) and 28 U.S.C. § 1605 note will be April 24, 2006.”); Collett v. Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, 362 F. Supp. 2d 230, 242 (D.D.C. 2005) (Urbina, J.) (holding that “the statute of limitations for the plaintiffs’ claims must be tolled to begin when the defendants were stripped of their immunity with the 1996 enactment of 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a)(7)” and denying Libya’s motion to dismiss); Wyatt v. Syrian Arab Republic, 398 F. Supp. 2d 131, 145 (D.D.C. 2005) (Urbina, J.) (finding July 2001 suit for abductions in August 1991 timely; “claims brought under § 1605(a)(7) are tolled up to April 24, 1996, the date of passage of § 1605(a)(7) and the first date that any foreign state’s immunity was Case 1:06-cv-00626-RMU Document 60 Filed 12/07/2007 Page 16 of 42 17 waived.”)
Filed November 20, 2007
; Flatow v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 999 F. Supp. 1, 24 (D.D.C. 1998) (holding “[a]n act which is acknowledged to be within a state’s discretion, although it violates federal and international law, can still be a valid act for the purposes of the Act of State doctrine”). Case 1:06-cv-01040-CKK Document 28 Filed 11/20/2007 Page 41 of 56 -31- of state); Ricaud v. Am. Metal Co., 246 U.S. 304 (1918) (same); Glen v. Club Mediterranee, S.A., 450 F.3d 1251, 1255 (11th Cir. 2006) (affirming dismissal of claims against third-party purchaser under act of state doctrine where resolution of claims wholly depended on questioning validity of Cuba’s expropriation of plaintiffs’ land)
Filed August 23, 2006
under the law of that state would not only be exceedingly difficult but, if wrongly made, would be likely to be highly offensive to the state in question.”); Society of Lloyd’s v. Siemon-Netto, No. 04-7214, 2006 WL 2252864, at *7 (D.C. Cir. Aug. 8, 2006) (defendants’ counterclaim, that English statute constituted an unlawful delegation of governmental authority, was barred by act of state doctrine); United States v. Merit, 962 F.2d 917, 921 (9th Cir. 1992) (holding act of state doctrine precluded examination of South Africa’s failure to issue a warrant under its extradition statute, because “[e]ven if the Republic did disregard its own laws in failing to issue a warrant of extradition, this court cannot question the validity of South Africa’s domestic actions”); World Wide Minerals, 296 F.3d at 1165-66 (holding that act of state doctrine barred court from second-guessing Kazakhstan’s sovereign decision to expropriate and transfer assets to Kazatomprom, a state-owned entity); Flatow v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 999 F. Supp. 1, 24 (D.D.C. 1998) (holding “[a]n act which is acknowledged to be within a state’s discretion, although it violates federal and international law, can still be a valid act for the purposes of the Act of State doctrine”). Accordingly, this case should be dismissed.
Filed June 26, 2006
As discussed above, allowing that attack, that infringement on Israeli sovereignty, would indeed hinder the conduct of foreign affairs. Plaintiffs also cite Flatow v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 999 F. Supp. 1, 24 (D.D.C. 1998), where the Court held that an attack on a bus by an organization the U.S. had designated as Case 1:05-cv-02167-PLF Document 12 Filed 06/26/2006 Page 31 of 33 -24- terrorist, with the support of a country the U.S. had designated as a state sponsor of terrorism, was not a “valid act[ ] of state.” That holding does not help Plaintiffs here, where the actions of an ally of the U.S., initiated within its own territory during military combat, against an organization designated by the U.S. as terrorist, resulted in civilian casualties.