Could "torture" lawyers lose their law licenses?
Dear readers: Today's blog is by our Justice reporter, Marisa Taylor:
The former Bush administration lawyers who helped come up with the justification for enhanced interrogation techniques could lose their law licenses if two anti-war groups have their way.
The groups filed complaints with the D.C. Bar and with four other states, accusing former Justice Department lawyers John Yoo, Jay Bybee and Steven Bradbury of colluding “to facilitate the abuse and torture of prisoners”, resulting in deaths at overseas U.S. military facilities.
The complaints also allege former Attorneys General Alberto Gonzales, John Ashcroft and Michael Mukasey should be held responsible for supporting the legal reasoning that justified the interrogation techniques.
Former Bush administration officials have argued they should not and cannot be held liable legally for policy decisions made in good faith.
Holding former administration officials accountable by pursuing ethics violations has gained traction among some groups in part because the Obama administration has expressed little interest in launching a criminal investigation into their conduct.
The complaints were filed Monday by VotersforPeace.US and Velvet Revolution and can be found here.
Does anybody honestly believe that John Yoo should be teaching at one of the most prestigious law schools in the country?
Posted by: American | June 08, 2009 at 12:34 AM
When dead Americans were being pulled from the wreckage of the WTC, Bush was guilty of blowing off the warnings he received telling him this was going to happen.
Posted by: American | June 08, 2009 at 12:32 AM
Believe that people will like you for who you are.
Forgive and forget.
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Posted by: bracelet | June 05, 2009 at 10:37 PM
How can you "in good faith" advocate doing something that is illegal under current law and treaties? Wouldn't you have to first at least advise to abrogate the treaty?
Posted by: borisjimbo | May 19, 2009 at 02:18 AM
Let's posthumously indict Andrew Jackson's Justice Department for allowing the president to ignore the Supreme Court and allow the eradication of Cherokees from Georgia. Let's posthumously indict Lincoln for anti-Constitutional suspension of Habeus Corpus. Let's indict Truman for the war crime of detonating a nuclear weapon over civilians. Let's indict Kennedy for assassinating the Ngos and starting the Viet Nam war. Reparations all around. Let's not stop until we've sliced and diced the world's sole security guarantor into ribbons, and there's nothing left between us and our enemies at all.
I want to hear answers to this question: when dead Americans are being pulled from the next terror scene on US soil, and our DHS apparatus had someone in custody who knew in advance about the attack was coddled and hugged, and consequently gave up nothing, allowing the attack to succeed, what will these sleeve-pinned cardio-exanguinators have to say for themselves? (Other than, "the US brought it on itself.")
Posted by: Owen | May 18, 2009 at 03:31 PM