Law and Disorder November 3, 2008 [56:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates:

• Troy Davis Update (Dalia Hashad)
• Guantanamo Update: Mohamed Jawad
• Bush Launches Last Minute Deregulation Push
• Emanuel (Toto) Constant - Haitian Death Squad Leader Sentenced To Prison On Mortgage Fraud
• Muslim, Arab, Men Rounded Up Post 9/11 Based On Racial Profiling: Ashcroft, Others Knew.
• R.A.N.D. Lobbys Pentagon: Start War To Save US Economy
• A Torturer’s Tale: Trained By The US, This is Why He Stopped
• Calls Go Out To Save Autistic Scots Hacker From Threat of US Prison.

—

Iraq Veterans Against The War: Jose Vasquez

The group Iraq Veterans Against The War or IVAW has emerged as the leading antiwar group in the United States. Recently, thousands of IVAW members held rallies and marches at the RNC and nearly 10 thousand marched at the DNC in Denver. The demonstrations urged presidential candidates to endorse ending the Iraq war and paying reparations to the people of Iraq.

The IVAW also calls for the immediate withdrawal of all occupying forces in Iraq, stopping the corporate pillaging of Iraq, and full benefits, adequate healthcare for returning servicemen and women. IVAW chapters are in 48 states, Canada and DC, members include recent veterans and active duty servicemen and women from all branches of military service, National Guard members, and reservists who have served in the United States military since September 11, 2001.

Guest - Jose Vasquez, a 14 year US Army veteran and conscientious objector. He is an active member of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) serving as the New York City chapter president. Jose was also a key organizer of Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan.

—

Iraq War - Status of Forces Agreement: Anthony Arnove

Nearly 4,200 US soldiers and 1 million Iraqi civilians have been killed in the US occupation of Iraq since 2003. .Right now there are 75 major US bases in Iraq, 140 thousand US troops and 180 thousand private contractors operating in Iraq. The cost of the Iraq War so far is 3 trillion and this year the monthly average expense is 12 billion dollars.

A pact recently negotiated in secret by the US government intends to extend the US occupation 3 more years in Iraq despite public and Congressional opposition. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have demonstrated against the pact that calls for full US withdrawal by 2012, but the agreement also leaves open the possible later date of withdrawal.

Anthony Arnove:

• Status of Forces Agreement; Orwellian slieght of hand - Combat troop withdrawal only.
• US is currently responsible for the detention of thousands of Iraqis who are being held without trial.
• 14 permanent US bases in Iraq: Areas to project power from in the future.
• Iraq: World’s second largest oil reserves, and world’s most strategic shipping routes.
• In the SOFA agreements, the US is making a condition to pass a national oil law.
• Iraq’s oil is distributed unevenly, leading to regional tensions between Kurdish and Shia regions.
• Obama rhetoric: Blaming the Iraqi people - the Iraqis haven’t spent money or achieved political reconciliation, or passed a national oil law

Guest - Editor and writer, Anthony Arnove, author of Iraq: The Logic Of Withdrawal.

Anthony Arnove Wikipedia Entry:

Arnove is best known for his books on Iraq and the Iraq War. Arnove is the author of the book Iraq: The Logic of Withdrawal, published in hardcover by the New Press and in paperback by Haymarket Books. Arnove toured the country promoting the book in spring 2006 as part of the New Press’ “End the War Tour”.

Arnove is also the editor of Iraq Under Siege, published by South End Press, the co-editor with Howard Zinn of Voices of a People’s History of the United States, published by Seven Stories Press, and the editor of The Essential Noam Chomsky, published by the New Press. He writes frequently for left-wing publications; he is a featured author at ZNet, a columnist for Socialist Worker, and on the editorial board of the International Socialist Review. He has also written for The Nation, In These Times, Le Nouvel Observateur, L’Humanité, and The Financial Times.

————————————————————————————————-

 

 Law and Disorder October 27, 2008 [57:59m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates:

• Michael Ratner on the Cuban Five, a Cuba Visit, the Uighurs and the Latest on Guantanamo.
• US Drops Charges for 5 Guantánamo Detainees
  
• US missiles’ Hit Pakistan school
• Blackwater Sends Warship to Gulf of Aden
• North American Army Created Without OK by Congress
• Guantanamo Guards Struggle With Hunger Striker
• U.S. Helicopters Attack Syrian Village
  

–

Stay Issued In Case of Troy Davis

Monday, October 27 was the day set for the execution of Troy Davis. A third stay has been issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. A 3 judge panel ordered attorneys to draft briefs that address whether Troy Davis can meet requirements for a next round of appeals. Attorneys have 15 days to file briefs.

Two weeks ago the Supreme Court refused to hear Troy Davis’ death penalty appeal, despite broad out pouring of support from former President Jimmy Carter, the European Parliament, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, to Jessie Jackson Jr. and this list goes on.

Lawyers Launch New Appeal Effort

Guest - Jessie Cohn with the Death Penalty Abolition Campaign Amnesty International USA

–

Former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge Arrested

Former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge was arrested last week near Tampa Florida on charges of obstruction of justice and perjury. The sixty year old retiree was picked up in his Apollo Beach home for allegedly lying about whether he tortured suspects in Chicago decades ago. According to People’s Law Office Attorney Flint Taylor, torture techniques included electric shocks and dry submarino, (suffocating with bags)

Under Seventh Circuit law if there’s a conspiracy to cover up the evidence in a civil case to show fraud then you can bring the case again. The People’s Law Office brought the case in 2005 and the city of Chicago refused to settle the case while pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars in that case. Flint Taylor says the city has spent over the 10 million dollars in aiding the defense of Commander Jon Burge.

• Chicago Mayor Daley Issues Sarcastic Apology for Torture
• Prosecutors Widen Chicago Police Torture Probe
• Law and Disorder Chicago Torture Archive

Guest - G. Flint Taylor, attorney at the Peoples Law Office.Taylor, a graduate of Brown University and Northwestern University School of Law and a founding partner of the People’s Law Office.

—-

Luis Posada Carriles: A Tribunal

We hear the last of the speeches from this tribunal. Brian Becker, Director, A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition.

From the New York Daily News: “It took years, but he is finally going to be charged in the U.S. for his crimes - even if only symbolically. It will occur here, in New York, when a tribunal composed of scholars and human rights activists take up the case of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, a man who is responsible for a long list of murderous attacks.

Posada, though, is a very lucky man. Despite his dark history, Posada remains free to roam Miami’s sunny streets and happily lives at home with his family. His rap sheet is long and deadly.  A convicted terrorist in two countries - he escaped Venezuela and was pardoned in Panama - Posada is considered the mastermind behind the 1976 bombing of Cubana Airlines Fight 455, which killed the 73 passengers on board, including the Cuban national fencing team. He is believed responsible for a string of hotel bombings in Cuba, resulting in the death of Italian tourist Fabio diCelmo. But these are only two examples of his treachery. Posada later boasted about the diCelmo killing in a New York Times interview, which should give everybody a clear idea of what kind of person this man is.

Inexplicably, the Justice Department has refused to classify the former CIA operative as a terrorist. The reason may have to be found in Posada’s long and extensive ties with the CIA and several other nation’s intelligence agencies.”

 

 Law and Disorder October 20, 2008 [57:25m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates:

• EFF Sues To Overturn Telecom Immunity
• Paris to quadruple number of CCTV cameras
• NYCLU, ACLU Warn NYPD About Illegal Arrests of School Children
• Supreme Court Declines To Hear Troy Davis Case
• The Financial Crisis Of US Capitalism

Federal Appeals Court Overturns Two Terrorist Convictions

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Sheik Mohammed Ali Al Moayad and Mohammed Mohsen Zayed, convicted of supporting terrorists, can have new trials. The men were convicted in federal court in Brooklyn after a six week trial in early 2005 on charges of conspiring to support Al Qaida and Hamas.

National Lawyers Guild Lawyer, Robert Boyle: This case involved an FBI sting operation where the FBI and the Dept of Justice lured Sheik Mohammed Ali Al Moayad and Mohammed Mohsen Zayed from their native Yemen to Germany.

• They were lured on the promise (…and this was an FBI informant that told them this) that they would provide hundreds of thousands of dollars to Al Moayad’s charitable organizations. The issue was entrapment - set up by the FBI.
• The Sheik went to Germany arrested there in 2003 after meetings with the informant -all recorded. He was brought to trial in Brooklyn but imprisoned in a Florence, Colorado supermax prison.
• The trial judge allowed the government to introduce a host of prejudicial and irrelevant evidence.
• Robert Boyle - “Its rare that they find the cumulative prejudicial evidence as grounds for reversal. This decision is gratifying and unique, its rare to get a reversal in a case where there is alleged terrorism.”
• Extremely similar to Lynne Stewart’s case, if you don’t have direct evidence, prejudice the jury. Raise the spectre of Osama Bin Laden and you hope that the jury overlooks the weaknesses of the government’s case and convicts.

Guest - Lynne Stewart, has also helped set up the Muslim Innocence Project for Muslims caught in similar entrapment.

Guest - Robert Boyle, a national lawyers guild attorney who represented Sheik Mohammed Ali Al Moayad and former civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart who tells us why this brings other issues to light in her case.

—

Luis Posada Carriles: A Tribunal

We hear a speech from Wayne Smith, Senior Fellow, Center for International Policy, he was among three speakers. We e will hear Brian Becker, Director of the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition in the weeks to come.

Wayne Smith addressed the failure of the United States, specifically the Bush family to prosecute Luis Posada Carriles on charges of terrorism. The failure to charge Posada with terrorism is an open violation of the Resolution 1373 of the UN Security Council. A resolution George Bush pushed through on the days following the attacks on 9/11.

—

–

Collateral Damage : Chris Hedges

Author, journalist Chris Hedges exposes the dark violence deep within the ranks of the Iraq War. The type of violence and eyewitness accounts you don’t hear about in the media. His book pulls together the 50 stories from by combat veterans as they describe the day to day carnage.

Chris Hedges:

• We wanted to give people a window into the sheer terror that has been visited on Iraqi civilians.
• Convoys have to keep moving: Running over children. If an IED goes off, soldiers lay down withering suppressive fire.
• The Sunnis are building a powerful force and will soon unleash a civil war
• Barack Obama speaks in the same toxic language of war bequeathed to us by the Bush Administration. He wants to expand the war in Afghanistan, he talks about leaving behind troops in the green zone and the super bases and fighting terrorism.
• We have no rights as citizens of this country to debate the terms of this occupation, in post Nuremberg terms this war is a criminal war of aggression.
• Resistance. We find our spiritual worth in our ability to resist and to take moral stance n0 matter how lonely.

Guest - Chris Hedges, author of many books specializing in American and Middle Eastern politics and society. He spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans and right now, he’s a senior fellow at The Nation Institue in New York City and a lecturer in the Council of the Humanities.

—————————————————————————————————

 

 Law and Disorder September 1, 2008 [55:23m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates

• Labor Day - Unions
• Pre-RNC Raids
• 5 arrested, dozens detained in pre-RNC raids
• Halliburton Sued For Human Trafficking
• Hacker Loses Extradition Appeal
• Government Conclusions on GTMO Deaths Do Not Absolve Gov’t of Responsibility

The Prosecution of President Bush and Other Administration Officials for War Crimes

This month, Larry Velvel, dean and co-founder of Massachusetts School of Law at Andover will hold a conference to plan the prosecution of President Bush and other administration officials for war crimes. The conference will take on the issues of both domestic and international crimes committed by high level Bush officials, including Federal judges and members of Congress. A coordinating committee of legal groups will also be created, among the legal groups are the Center for Constitutional Rights, ACLU, National Lawyers Guild. Official Site

“This is not intended to be a mere discussion of violations of law that have occurred,” says convener Lawrence Velvel, dean and cofounder of the school. “It is, rather, intended to be a planning conference at which plans will be laid and necessary organizational structures set up, to pursue the guilty as long as necessary and, if need be, to the ends of the Earth.” related article

Velvel Interview Notes:

• Conference will be held in undisclosed location for the time being.
• Until people have the fear they will be brought to book if they violate the law in a very serious ways that cause tens of thousands of deaths, what will stop them from doing it in the future?
• Unless there is something to look back on, like the Germans and the Japanese apparently know, don’t do it again because people swung.
• Who’s to say it won’t happen 20 or 30 years in the future again.

Guest - Lawrence R. Velvel, Dean of Massachusetts School of Law and a professor of law. Mr. Velvel is a 1960 graduate of the University of Michigan and a 1963 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School, where he served on the law review and was elected to the Order of the Coif. He was a law professor from 1966-1978, first at the University of Kansas and then at Catholic University. He has been a partner in major law firms in Washington, D.C., and was the first chief counsel of an organization established to write United States Supreme Court briefs in support of state and local governments. read more.

—-

New Guidelines Would Give F.B.I. Broader Powers

A Justice Department proposal which could be made public in a month, has given the government even broader license to open terrorism investigations, without any evidence of wrongdoing, relying instead on racial or ethnic profiling. Currently, FBI agents need specific reasons, such as evidence or allegations that a law probably has been violated, to investigate US citizens and legal residents. Last month, The Council on American Islamic Relations decried the forthcoming plan as “unconstitutional and un-American.”

This proposal is among other aggressive plans the Bush administration has put in place such as new wiretapping regulations and authorizing greater sharing of intelligence information with the local police. The Director of National Intelligence has set up - Information Sharing Environment - where certain police authorities will have access to information produced by the FBI, by the intelligence community and also by police departments around the country.
It is “one stop shopping” for all these different police agencies and even private companies to have access to this highly speculative, accusatory, fragmented and often erroneous information.

Intelligence Fusion Centers - which I think is a real problem, particularly since there’s very little oversight of these centers
there’s no way to correct these watch files, - a main problem with the closed system, where no one has an opportunity to go in and say you got this piece wrong.

Related Article : Colorado ‘fusion center’ to step up intelligence gathering during DNC

Mike German Quotes:

• Giving the FBI more authority to collect more information isn’t helping the FBI be more effective.
• Gathering information about innocent people won’t help find guilty people.
• There is no terrorism profile, people are drawn to terrorism for all sorts of reasons.
• Terrorism watch list : 1 million individual records - clearly nobody believes there’s a million terrorists out there.
• The FBI don’t know to this day, how many national security letters they’ve issued.
  

Guest - Mike German, attorney with the ACLU and former FBI agent. Mike German is a recognized expert in terrorist group behavior, counter-terrorist operations, and right-wing extremism. He has appeared on Dateline NBC, Paula Zahn Now, CNN, and MSNBC and his commentary has been published in the National Law Journal and the Washington Post. Mike served for sixteen years as a Special Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and is one of the few agents credited with actually having prevented acts of terrorism before it became the FBI’s number one priority.

—————————————————————————————-

 

 Law and Disorder August 25, 2008 [57:52m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates:

• Haitian Death Squad Leader Toto Constant Found Guilty of Mortgage Fraud
• Michael Ratner and Lawsuit Against Revolutionary Front For Haitian Advancement and Progress
• Antiwar Activists Win 2 Million Settlement from New York City: Carlyle Group Protest
• A Look At the DNC Protester Prison
• The Trial Of Donald Rumsfeld: A Prosecution By Book, by Michael Ratner
• Human Rights First Unveils Plan for Closing Guantanamo
• New York Times: A New Rush To Spy
  

Arbitrary Justice: Trials of Bagram and Guantanamo in Afghanistan

Human Rights First and Sahr MuhammedAlly have come out with a powerful report detailing the transfer of Guantanamo and Bagram prisoners to be prosecuted at the Afghan National Detention Facility in Kabul known as Block D. The report is titled Arbitrary Justice: Trials of Bagram and Guantanamo in Afghanistan. Among the details, the report describes that more than 250 former Guantánamo and Bagram detainees have been transferred to Block D, a facility built by the US government to hold and prosecute former Guantanamo and Bagram prisoners.

More than 160 have been referred for prosecution. The detainees are being charged under Afghan law for crimes ranging from treason and destruction of government property to threatening the security of Afghanistan. Defendants have been sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging from 3 to 20 years, their trials last from 30 minutes to an hour.

Arbitrary Justice: Trials of Bagram and Guantanamo in Afghanistan

Guest - Sahr MuhammedAlly, senior associate in Human Rights First’s Law & Security Program. Through research and advocacy Sahr works on U.S. counterterrorism and national security policies to ensure respect for human rights. Sahr has conducted human rights fact-finding research in Afghanistan, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Pakistan.

—-

Teenage Detainees: Mohammed Jawad

We want to bring listeners up to date with the case of Mohammed Jawad. He was captured by Afghan police on December 17, 2002, and handed over to US forces the same day. According to his military defense lawyer, Jawad was briefly held at Bagram Air Base and transported to Guantanamo in January 2003. The same time period as portrayed in Taxi To The Dark Side.

Emi MacLean Interview Notes:

• Mohammed Jawad is facing trial by military commissions, created by executive order.
• Military commissions by executive order: illegal by the Supreme Court decision in Hamdan v Rumsfeld.
• In response to Hamdan v Rumsfeld, Congress passed the Military Commissions Act in 2006
• MCA 2006: Allows for secret trials / secret parts of trials /denying the accused the right to be tried by an impartial court /allows coerced testimony to be used; usually information gathered from being tortured.

Emi Maclean - “If you think the system is deeply, deeply flawed, look again, when the Dept of Defense couldn’t get what they wanted, they fired a judge. In the case of Omar Katr, the judge had ordered the government to produce information about the conditions of his detention and the conditions of which Omar’s statements were made. Even in a situation where the system is in favor of the government, the judge was replaced when that judge ruled against the government.”

Michael Ratner - “Even if Jawad is acquitted by this show trial, the (Bush) administration still says they can hold people indefinitely.”

Guest - Emi MacLean, staff attorney at the Center For Constitutional Rights and with the Guantánamo Global Justice Initiative (GGJI) since June 2006. She works on issues related to Guantánamo and other forms of executive detention, including secret prisons and transfers-to-torture. She helps coordinate the pro bono attorneys representing the hundreds of men still detained at Guantánamo and supports CCR’s direct representation of a number of current detainees.

————————————————————————————————————-

 

 Law and Disorder August 18, 2008 [55:48m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates:

• Extremely Rare: Court Moves To Rehear Case of Canadian Rendition Victim Maher Arar
• NYC’s Plan To Track Everything That Moves
• Outrage At NYPD Plan To Track Vehicles
• NYPD Travel To London For Security Tips
• Detention Camp Set Up For DNC Protesters
• UK: Zero Privacy

CCR Campaign: The First 100 Days

Vincent Warren, Executive Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights talks with hosts about the CCR campaign titled the First 100 Days. Warren says there is a clear opportunity for the next president to steer things in a new direction, to repudiate the executive orders that have been put in place by George W. Bush, and by the sidestepping of the Justice Department. A lot of the reversal can be done without Congress because they are executive orders. The First 100 Days campaign will put this information(PDF) in the hands of the people to make the next administration accountable. Law and Disorder will have more programming on the First 100 Days.

Guest - Vincent Warren, Executive Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights

—

20 Years Later: Dozens of Black Men Remain Behind Bars In Chicago After Being Tortured

According to the People’s Law Office in Chicago, at least 24 African American men are still serving sentences for crimes they say they confessed to after being tortured by Chicago Police officers. The happened when the Chicago police precinct was under Commander Jon Burge in the early 70’s to the 1992. Jon Burge is a Vietnam Vet who is said to have brought back torture to Chicago. People’s Law Office Attorney Flint Taylor says Burge shot through the ranks all the way to commander, primarily by leading a band of torturers. They used methods such as electric shock, dry submarino, (suffocating with bags)

Flint Taylor on the Daryl Cannon Torture Case:

• Flint Taylor represents torture victim Daryl Cannon who the city has admitted they tortured and settled for 3 thousand dollars twenty years ago before any evidence of the systemic torture came out.
• Under Seventh Circuit law if there’s a conspiracy to cover up the evidence in a civil case to show fraud then you can bring the case again. The PLO brought the case in 2005 and the city of Chicago still refuses to settle the case and they’re pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars in that case.
• They’re over the 10 million dollar mark and pumping more in to the defense of Commander Jon Burge. We’ve calculated the pensions that have been paid to Burge and the 25 other implicated torturers; its over 25 million because statute of limitations have no remedy.

The Peoples Law Office attorneys are also battling to get the remaining men off of death row and to get them hearings. They’re also battling to get the states attorney and DA to Richard Daily former Chicago mayor and Richard Devine to the carpet because they had evidence to prosecute Burge criminally, thus allowing torture ring to continue.

The Committee of Torture in the United Nations has connected the torture brought back to the U.S. in Chicago with torture in Guantanamo and other black sites around the world.

Guest - G. Flint Taylor, attorney at the Peoples Law Office.Taylor, a graduate of Brown University and Northwestern University School of Law and a founding partner of the People’s Law Office.

—-

Beyond Guantanamo Speech: Pardiss Kebriaei

We hear from Pardiss Kebriaei, Staff Attorney, Guantánamo Global Justice Initiative, at the Center For Constitutional Rights who spoke at the event titled, Beyond Guantanamo.

Now that key rulings issued by the Supreme Court affirm the constitutional rights of Guantánamo detainees to challenge their detention in the federal courts, what does the future hold for Guantanamo detainees and the rule of law? In the cases of Boumediene v. Bush and Al Odah v. United States, the June 2008 Supreme Court ruling has undone the attempts of the Bush administration and Congress to suspend the fundamental right of habeas corpus. Closing Guantanamo is on top of the list of actions in the First 100 Days for the next U.S. President’s Administration.

Among the speakers:

• Vincent Warren, Executive Director, CCR,
• Stephen Abraham, Guantánamo whistleblower, attorney, and U.S. Army reserve officer who served on a military “combatant status review tribunal”
• Baher Azmy, Professor of Law, Seton Hall University and habeas counsel to Guantánamo detainees

——————————————————————–

 

 Law and Disorder June 9, 2008 [57:06m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Updates:

• U.S. Politicians and Scholars Are Helping Turkey Cover up WWI Armenian Genocide
• Cluster bomb ban treaty approved: US, China and Russia Oppose
• CCR Report: U.S. Government Allows Security Forces from Brutal Human Rights Abusing Regimes to Threaten Prisoners at Guantánamo

The Day Freedom Died: The Colfax Massacre, the Supreme Court, and the Betrayal of Reconstruction

It was April 13, 1873 in Louisiana when a small army of white ex-Confederate soldiers enraged by freedmen asserting their new rights killed more than 60 African Americans who had occupied a courthouse. Today we talk with author and journalist Charles Lane. His recent book is titled The Day Freedom Died: The Colfax Massacre, the Supreme Court, and the Betrayal of Reconstruction. In the book, Lane uncovers a nearly forgotten historic post civil war massacre of African American men in Colfax, Louisiana and a white lawyer’s epic battle to bring the perpetrators to justice. Reviews call Lane’s book an electrifying piece of historical detective work that captures a gallery of characters from presidents to townspeople and re-creates the bloody days of Reconstruction. Lane discovered the Colfax Massacre case while covering the Supreme Court for The Washington Post.

Guest - Charles Lane, member of the editorial page staff, is the author of “The Day Freedom Died: The Colfax Massacre, the Supreme Court and the Betrayal of Reconstruction.”

–

Ann Ginger : Meiklejohn Civil Liberties

Today we’re delighted to have Ann Ginger on the program, she’s a lawyer, teacher, writer, and political activist. She is the founder and the executive director of the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties, a think tank for human rights in Berkeley California. Here on Law and Disorder we’ve examine the practices and laws that have crippled civil and human rights in this country and now we take a look at ways law students and legal workers can bring them back.

Ann Ginger at Meiklejohn Civil Liberties has published Four Little Orange Books. The first is titled: Landmark Cases left Out of your Textbooks, the second is The Living Constitution, the third, Undoing The Bush/Cheney Legacy - Restoring Lost Liberties: A Tool Kit For Congress and fourth, Making the Universal Declaration the Supreme Law of the Land. Ann writes - the roles of successful lawyers and legal workers in the future will not be the same as the roles of successful lawyers before the Bush-Cheney “war on terrorism. “

Guest - Ann Ginger. Ann is Executive Director of Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute, a center for peace law and human rights, with archives of historic cases. Founded in 1965, the Institute answers queries of clients and lawyers and trains interns to prepare reports on U.S. compliance with human rights treaties for submission to U.N. committees.

Ann learned early to use the law and history to work for peace and human rights, coming from an Irish Catholic, English Quaker, Russian Jewish, Midwestern newspaper family. As a lawyer, she won a civil liberties case in the U.S. Supreme Court. After her testimony as an expert witness on international law that applies in the U.S., a jury acquitted nuclear weapons protesters in Utah. She is now teaching Peace Law and Human Rights at San Francisco State University and long served on the Peace and Justice Commission that administers the Nuclear Free Zone Ordinance in Berkeley.

 

 Law and Disorder May 26, 2008 [54:21m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Deepening Economic Crisis: What Laws Are In Place To Protect Against Economic Fleecing of the United States?

Law and Disorder Encore Interview: Two million families are on the brink of foreclosure, tent cities pop up along US city outskirts, and as UK press declare “depression” in the United States, we talk with Max Fraad Wolff , instructor at the Graduate Program in International Affairs, New School University. The media has reported that millions of US families took out loans to big for their incomes and were foreclosed, but hosts look at The Glass Steagall Act, mortgage sharking and banking predators.

Max is a freelance researcher, strategist, and writer in the areas of international finance and macroeconomics. His work can be seen at the Huffington Post, The AsiaTimes, Prudent Bear, and many other outlets.

Related: People Sleep In Cars In Rich U.S. City

–

New York City Law Review Symposium: Preventing Torture

We hear a speech by Margaret Satterwaite on secret detention and extraordinary rendition at the New York City Law Review Symposium titled Preventing Torture. Margaret is the assistant professor of Clinical Law and Faculty Director of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at the New York University School of Law. Her current research focuses on human rights in the “war on terror.” She directs the “Black Sites” Litigation Project at NYU and her recent publications include Rendered Meaningless: Extraordinary Rendition and the Rule of Law. Margaret is also co-chair of the Human Rights Interest Group and the American Society of International Law.

Margaret’s speech was part of a panel titled Protected Contexts a look at how states acting through private entities to rendition and also what obligations exist to prevent violence and torture. She was among several speakers we will be presenting in the coming weeks.

More about the Symposium: Preventing Torture

This Symposium brings together leading international and U.S. experts, including former military officials, academics, practitioners, human rights advocates, politicians, journalists, and students to explore recent developments in the international law of torture.

The General Comment addresses key fault lines in the absolute prohibition against torture and ill-treatment that have been opened in the name of counter-terrorism. It also underscores the applicability of the Convention to sexualized and gender violence, where perpetrated by state officials as well as where state officials acquiesce to private violence, including domestic violence.

Speakers will address the authority, adequacy, and policy implications of the General Comment. Since the U.S. is a State party to the CAT, speakers will also address the relevance of the Comment to current laws and practices of the Bush administration and to positive reforms and initiatives needed to bring U.S. law and practice into compliance with its international commitments to eliminate torture and ill-treatment in every sphere.

 

 Law and Disorder May 19, 2008 [57:37m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Ending The War In Iraq: Tom Hayden

Long time political and social activist Tom Hayden joins Law and Disorder hosts for a lively interview and discussion on specific ways to end the illegal war in Iraq. Tom Hayden is a former California state senator, a passionate anti-war activist and has published an anthology titled “Writings For A Democratic Society” , in it he chronicles key civil rights movements and potent sixties activism. The book is a collection of essays, pamphlets, op-ed pieces from the Port Huron Statement - a manifesto for sixties radicals, to reports on the riots at Chicago’s 1968 Democratic National Convention.

Guest - Tom Hayden, political and social activist, author of Ending The War In Iraq. Tom Hayden’s Blog

–

Green Scare: The Case of Briana Waters

Here on Law and Disorder we’ve discussed how since December 2005, environmental activists in the United States have been targeted and handed unusually harsh prison sentences. It’s called Green Scare and more than a year ago the National Lawyer’s Guild sponsored an event titled Green Scare - How the Government Is Targeting Eco-Activists. Listen to it here.

Last year the NLG established a hotline 1-888-NLG-ECOL for activists who had been targeted by the FBI for environmental activism.

We bring this up in context of the case involving Briana Waters. Acting as a lookout, she was accused of conspiring to set fire to the University of Washington’s Center for Urban Horticulture in 2001. This, despite evidence presented by the defense that she was 60 miles away at the time of the arson. Others claimed responsibility for the fire, but Ms. Waters, a 32 year old mother and violin teacher may face a mandatory minimum of 35 years in prison.

Federal “conspiracy law” is used often to prosecute drug dealers and is being used by prosecutors to take down individual environmental protesters. Once the judge accepts the charge of conspiracy, here-say is admissible making conspiracy very easy to prove in court.

Guest: California civil rights attorney Ben Rosenfeld

–

An Innocent Man In Guantanamo: Five Years of My Life, Part III

Today we hear excerpts from the third part of the event An Innocent Man In Guantanamo: Five Years of My Life. That’s the title of the memoirs recently released by Murat Kurnaz who was detained at Guantanamo for five years. Kurnaz is a Turkish citizen and legal resident of Germany, he traveled to Pakistan to learn more about his Muslim faith and was later arrested at a checkpoint, handed to the United States and eventually taken to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Former US Army Muslim Chaplain of Guantanamo Bay, James Yee voices his concern about other secret prisons in Afghanistan and systematic abuse to prisoners involving IRF teams.

The event presented by Friends of the Library, brought together a panel of lawyers from the U.S. and Germany who fought for Murat’s release and a Guantanamo chaplain who was accused of espionage and imprisoned. The panel was moderated by our own Michael Ratner. Speakers include:

• Baher Azmy - Professor at Seton Hall Law School, where he directs a civil rights clinic and teaches constitutional law. His litigation work on national security and human rights cases emerging from the “war on terror” include lawfulness of extraordinary rendition, torture and indefinite executive detention. In July 2004, Azmy began representation of Murat Kurnaz imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay until his release in August 2006.
• Bernhard Docke - a lawyer since 1983, specializes in criminal law, since 1989 partner of the law firm “Dr. Heinrich Hannover und Partner” in Bremen, Germany. He has been a lawyer for Mr. Kurnaz since 2002.
• Wallace Shawn - an Obie-winning playwright and a stage and screen actor. His plays include The Designated Mourner, Marie and Bruce, The Fever, and Aunt Dan and Lemon. He co-wrote and starred in the art-house classic My Dinner with Andre and he also performed in numerous Woody Allen films including Manhattan and Radio Days. Our Late Night and a Thought in Three Parts: Two Plays will be published in Spring 2008.
• James Yee - the former US Army Muslim Chaplain of Guantanamo Bay. His book, For God And Country, Faith and Patriotism Under Fire, tells the story about being wrongly accused of espionage and imprisoned by the U.S. military. In 2004, the government dropped all charges against him and he received an honorable discharge from the U.S. Army.
• Phillipe Sands - an international lawyer and a professor of law at University College London. He is the author of Lawless World and is frequently a commentator on news and current affairs programs including CNN, MSNBC and BBC World Service. Sands has been involved in many international cases, including the World Court trial of Slobodan Milosevic and the treatment of British detainees at Guantanamo Bay. His article in Vanity Fair “The Green Light,” looks at how high level members of the Bush administration pressured underlings to use torture tactics at Guantanamo. He is also the author of Torture Team: Rumsfeld’s Memo and the Betrayal of American Values.

 

 Law and Disorder April 28, 2008 [57:52m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 

 Sean Bell Verdict - WBAI - Recorded by producer/reporter Sally O'Brien [5:25m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

“Lawyers You’ll Like” Series: Ramsey Clark

Ramsey Clark, former Attorney General of the United States, under President Lyndon B. Johnson. The first Attorney General at the Justice Department to call for the elimination of the death penalty and all electronic surveillance. After he left the Johnson administration, he became a vociferous critic of the Vietnam War and continued on a radical path, defending the underdog, defending the rights of people worldwide, from Palestinians to Iraqis, to anyone who found themselves at the repressive end of government action.

During his years at the Justice Department:

• supervised the federal presence at Ole Miss during the week following the admission of James Meredith;
• surveyed all school districts in the South desegregating under court order (1963);
• supervised federal enforcement of the court order protecting the march from Selma to Montgomery; and
• headed the Presidential task force to Watts following the riots.
• supervised the drafting and executive role in passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and Civil Rights Act of 1968.

–

-

An Innocent Man In Guantanamo: Five Years of My Life, Part II

Today we hear excerpts from the second part of the event An Innocent Man In Guantanamo: Five Years of My Life. That’s the title of the memoirs recently released by Murat Kurnaz who was detained at Guantanamo for five years. Kurnaz is a Turkish citizen and legal resident of Germany, he traveled to Pakistan to learn more about his Muslim faith and was later arrested at a checkpoint, handed to the United States and eventually taken to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. We hear part 1 of a 3 part series from this discussion.

The event presented by Friends of the Library, brought together a panel of lawyers from the U.S. and Germany who fought for Murat’s release and a Guantanamo chaplain who was accused of espionage and imprisoned. The panel was moderated by our own Michael Ratner. Speakers include:

• Baher Azmy - Professor at Seton Hall Law School, where he directs a civil rights clinic and teaches constitutional law. His litigation work on national security and human rights cases emerging from the “war on terror” include lawfulness of extraordinary rendition, torture and indefinite executive detention. In July 2004, Azmy began representation of Murat Kurnaz imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay until his release in August 2006.
• Bernhard Docke - a lawyer since 1983, specializes in criminal law, since 1989 partner of the law firm “Dr. Heinrich Hannover und Partner” in Bremen, Germany. He has been a lawyer for Mr. Kurnaz since 2002.
• Wallace Shawn - an Obie-winning playwright and a stage and screen actor. His plays include The Designated Mourner, Marie and Bruce, The Fever, and Aunt Dan and Lemon. He co-wrote and starred in the art-house classic My Dinner with Andre and he also performed in numerous Woody Allen films including Manhattan and Radio Days. Our Late Night and a Thought in Three Parts: Two Plays will be published in Spring 2008.
• James Yee - the former US Army Muslim Chaplain of Guantanamo Bay. His book, For God And Country, Faith and Patriotism Under Fire, tells the story about being wrongly accused of espionage and imprisoned by the U.S. military. In 2004, the government dropped all charges against him and he received an honorable discharge from the U.S. Army.
• Phillipe Sands - an international lawyer and a professor of law at University College London. He is the author of Lawless World and is frequently a commentator on news and current affairs programs including CNN, MSNBC and BBC World Service. Sands has been involved in many international cases, including the World Court trial of Slobodan Milosevic and the treatment of British detainees at Guantanamo Bay. His article in Vanity Fair “The Green Light,” looks at how high level members of the Bush administration pressured underlings to use torture tactics at Guantanamo. He is also the author of Torture Team: Rumsfeld’s Memo and the Betrayal of American Values.