[JURIST] The New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) [advocacy website] Wednesday filed a lawsuit [complaint, PDF; press release] in the US District Court for the District of Columbia against private security contractor Blackwater USA [corporate website; JURIST news archive] on behalf of an Iraqi man killed during a September 9 shooting in Baghdad. The lawsuit alleges that Blackwater guards fired indiscriminately into a crowd of civilians, killing five.

In October, CCR filed a different lawsuit [JURIST report] against Blackwater on behalf of an injured survivor and the families of 3 men killed during a September 16 shooting incident in Baghdad [JURIST report] that took the lives of 17 Iraqi civilians. That complaint [PDF text] alleged that Blackwater violated US law and should be liable for assault and battery, wrongful death, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligence. AP has more.

[JURIST] The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) [official website] Wednesday rejected [press release] California's request for a waiver that would have allowed it and 16 other states following its lead to impose stricter greenhouse gas emissions standards on cars and light trucks. EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson told reporters that the White House prefers a single unified national standard to a state-by-state network of regulations, and pointed to the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 [HR 6 materials; WH fact sheet], signed into law Wednesday by President George W. Bush. The act will require automakers to reach an industry-wide average fuel efficiency for cars, SUVs and small trucks of 35 miles per gallon by 2020. California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said California will appeal the decision [statement text].

Last month, California filed a lawsuit [complaint, PDF; JURIST report] in the US District Court for the District of Columbia against the EPA in an effort to force it to come to a decision on whether California could impose the stricter standards. The California standards would have required car manufacturers to cut emissions by 25 percent from cars and light trucks, and 18 percent from SUVs, starting with the 2009 model year. California's Air Resources Board [official website] adopted the greenhouse gas standards in 2004 [press release], but it could not mandate them unless the EPA granted a waiver of the lighter Federal Clean Air Act (CAA) [text] standards. California is the only state permitted to seek a waiver under the CAA, but if granted, other states have the option of choosing between the federal standards and those of California. At least 11 states had indicated that they would follow the California standard. This is the first time that the EPA has denied California a waiver since Congress established the state's right to seek CAA waivers in 1967. AP has more.

[JURIST] Fair elections in Pakistan are impossible as long as the judiciary remains beholden to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf [official website; JURIST news archive] and scores of lawyers, activists and government critics remain in detention, Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] said in a report [text] released [press release] Wednesday. The 84-page report details how the November 3 declaration of emergency has been used to cripple the judiciary and weaken the lawyers' movement through police intimidation and arbitrary detentions. HRW said:

In the name of fighting terrorism and Islamist extremism, Musharraf instead mounted what was effectively a coup against Pakistan's civil society. Targets of the crackdown included lawyers, judges, human rights activists, opposition political party members, journalists, students, and academics.

The declaration of the state of emergency itself was not, as Musharraf claimed, necessitated by new terrorism threats, but by perceived threats to his own continued rule by an energized, principled lawyers' movement calling for genuine respect for independence of the judiciary and the rule of law. Scores of government opponents including lawyers remain in prison across the country today; the leaders of the lawyers’ movement and senior judges of the Supreme Court remain under house arrest. Thousands have been released, but the fear of being re-arrested hangs over them as charges against them under the Anti-Terrorism Act remain on file. Under the restored constitution, lawyers have to contend with the possibility of being banned from their profession should they earn the government's ire. And all government opponents face the very real possibility of finding themselves in "legal" military custody and facing prosecution by military courts under the amended Army Act.

[JURIST] Three UK residents [JURIST news archive] released Wednesday from Guantanamo Bay were detained by UK authorities when they arrived in the UK later in the day. Libyan Omar Deghayes and Algerian Abdennour Sameur were arrested and Jordanian Jamil el Banna was detained under the UK Terrorism Act [text]. Deghayes and el-Banna may face extradition to Spain, although the British government has said that it will review the released men's immigration statuses to determine whether they may remain in the country. Two other UK residents [JURIST report] still remain at Guantanamo: Saudi Arabian Shaker Abdur-Raheem Aamer, who is expected to return to his native country, and Ethiopian Binyam Mohammed al Habashi, who will stay in US custody. BBC News has more.

In August, the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office [official website] asked the United States to release the five [press release; JURIST report], who were legal residents in the UK prior to their detention at Guantanamo. British officials under the government of former Prime Minister Tony Blair had initially refused to seek the release of the British resident aliens held at Guantanamo Bay, and el Banna and Deghayes were among a group of detainees who lost a court bid [JURIST report] to force the UK government to lobby the US for their release. All UK nationals detained at Guantanamo were returned to the UK by January 2005.

[JURIST] A French court Wednesday sentenced five Frenchmen released from the US detention center at Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] to one year in prison for "criminal association with a terrorist enterprise" after a retrial. A sixth defendant was acquitted. The men were charged with allegedly attending combat training at an al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan. They were repatriated to France from Guantanamo in July 2004 and March 2005 [BBC reports]. The five men convicted had served provisional sentences in France and were released before the trial's conclusion; they will not be returning to prison. The prosecution sought the one-year convictions for the use of false travel documentation to "integrate terrorist structures" in Afghanistan and called their Guantanamo detention a "defiance of international law."

France formally charged the six defendants [JURIST report] in April 2006. During their original September 2006 trial, the judge refused to deliver a verdict [JURIST report], instead saying that he wanted to know more about a French intelligence-gathering mission in which French agents had interviewed the six men while still at Guantanamo. The French government at first failed to disclose the meetings [JURIST report], a fact that could have rendered the case invalid. During the retrial [JURIST report], a French diplomatic telegram published in the Liberation daily referred to intelligence agents who conducted interviews with the suspects at least twice while at Guantanamo [Liberation report, in French]. AP has more.

[JURIST] A Spanish anti-terrorism court Wednesday convicted 47 Basque separatists of either leading, being a member of, or collaborating with a "terrorist organization," and sentenced each to between 2 and 20 years in prison. The 47 were members of various groups pushing for Basque independence, but prosecutors argued that all had ties to terror group ETA [BBC backgrounder]. Five other defendants were found not guilty. The Daily Telegraph has more.

In October, three political leaders in the Basque region, including its president, were ordered to stand trial [PDF text; JURIST report] for meeting publicly with members of the Batasuna party [BBC profile] to negotiate an ETA ceasefire. The Batasuna party is alleged to be a front for the ETA, which has been blamed for more than 800 deaths in bombings and attacks since the 1960s.

[JURIST] A judge on the US District Court for the Western District of Kentucky [official site] ruled Tuesday that former Pfc. Steven D. Green [JURIST news archive] will stand trial on April 13, 2009, for his role in the March 2006 rape and murder of a 14-year old Iraqi girl [JURIST news archive] and the murder of her family in Mahmudiya. The 2009 trial date was set to satisfy defense requests for adequate preparation time. Twenty-two-year old Green, the alleged ringleader in the attack, is the only implicated soldier to face federal charges [docket] under the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act [PDF text] because he was discharged from military service before the charges arose. Green, accused of raping the girl and shooting the entire family, pleaded not guilty [JURIST report]. Prosecutors have indicated that they will seek the death penalty [JURIST report] if he is convicted.

Four soldiers [JURIST report] from 101st Airborne Division have already been convicted in military court for crimes stemming from the incident. Spc. James P. Barker and Sgt. Paul E. Cortez [JURIST reports] received prison sentences of 90 and 100 years respectively after they pleaded guilty to participating in the attack. Pfc. Bryan L. Howard, who stayed at the soldiers' checkpoint but had prior knowledge of the plan, was sentenced to 27 months after pleading guilty [JURIST report] in March to conspiracy to commit rape and premeditated murder and conspiracy to obstruct justice. Pfc. Jesse Spielman was sentenced to 110 years in prison after being convicted [JURIST report] on four counts of felony murder, rape, conspiracy to commit rape, and housebreaking with intent to commit rape. All four will be eligible for parole in 10 years. AP has more.

[JURIST] The Indonesian Supreme Court has rejected the final appeal of three men sentenced to death for their roles in the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings [BBC backgrounder], an Indonesian prosecutor said Wednesday. The court's decision has not yet been formally released, but prosecutor Made Sudarmaja said Wednesday that his office has been notified of the court's decision. The three Islamic militants - Mukhlas, Amrozi, and Imam Samudra [BBC profiles] - will be given one month to seek clemency from the Indonesian president, but the three have said that they have no plans to do so. Sudarmaja said that if clemency is not requested after a month has passed, the executions will proceed "immediately."

Earlier this year, Indonesia reduced the sentences [JURIST report] of 10 other Islamic militants convicted for their roles in the 2002 and 2005 Bali bombings [BBC report]. Originally serving between eight to 18 years, six of the militants received a sentence reduction of five months, while the other four received a reduction of two months. Terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah [MIPT backgrounder; JURIST news archive] has been blamed for both Bali bombings. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] A court in Argentina on Tuesday convicted eight formal officials for human rights abuses committed during the 1976-83 Dirty War [GlobalSecurity backgrounder]. The seven former army officers and a former police official were tried in connection with the kidnapping, torture and disappearances of a group of leftist guerrillas. Three defendants, including former Army chief Cristino Nicolaides, now 80, were sentenced to 25 years in prison, while the remaining defendants received sentences ranging from 20 to 23 years.

In 2005, the Argentinean Supreme Court struck down amnesty laws [JURIST report] adopted in the 1980s, prompting the government to reopen hundreds of human rights cases, though only a handful of those who played a role in crimes during the Dirty War have faced trial thus far. In October, former military chaplain and Catholic priest Christian von Wernich was convicted of crimes against humanity, and former police officials Miguel Etchecolatz [JURIST reports] and Julio Simon were convicted last year. Hector Febres, a former director of the detention center at the Navy Mechanics School [BBC backgrounder], was on trial, but was found dead [JURIST reports] in his military jail cell earlier this month. Former president Reynaldo Bignone [JURIST report] also faces charges. In April, a federal court revoked the pardons [JURIST report] of Jorge Videla and Emilio Eduardo Massera [Trial Watch profiles], and Ricardo Miguel Cavallo [JURIST news archive] faces charges in Spain. AP has more.

[JURIST] US District Court Judge Stephan Mickle of the Northern District of Florida [official website] granted a preliminary injunction [PDF text] Tuesday blocking the implementation of a new Florida voting law intended to prevent election fraud in the state. The law would prevent a person from registering to vote if their social security or driver's license numbers cannot be matched to government databases. Three civil rights groups filed a lawsuit [amended complaint, text] in September against the state seeking the injunction, asserting that 14,000 voters were unable to register because of the law. The plaintiffs argued in Florida NAACP v. Browning [Brennan Center backgrounder] that the risk of error from typos in the databases and the use of multiple or nontraditional last names by minority citizens prevents many of them from registering under the new law. Proponents say that the law complies with federal standards. Florida Secretary of State Kurt Browning [official profile] said he would appeal the injunction, which was issued six weeks before the Florida presidential primary.

Last year, a federal judge struck down a similar law [Brennan Center press release] in Washington state. Under that law, nearly 16 percent of the state's citizens were unable to vote pending a review of discrepancies in their identification matches to government databases. The lawsuit [complaint, PDF] was brought by several civil rights groups. Federal law requires each state to maintain a database of registered voters, but it does not require "No Match, No Vote" laws like those passed by Florida and Washington. AP has more.

[JURIST] The Israeli government has failed to investigate and indict members of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) [official website] for acts of violence committed against Palestinian civilians, according to a report [PDF text] issued Tuesday by Israeli human rights group Yesh Din [advocacy website]. According to the report, thousands of Palestinian civilians have been killed during the last seven years, but the Israeli government has only opened 239 investigations into such killings. Additionally, the report says that only 10 percent of criminal investigations of IDF troops have resulted in any indictment being filed.

Yesh Din concluded:

it is the IDF's duty to protect the civilian population that is not involved in the hostilities, a duty set forth in the Laws of Belligerent Occupation, the branch of International Law of Armed Conflict and in International Human Rights Law. The figures [represented in the report] present the IDF's de facto derogation of that duty. They mean that any soldiers serving in the [occupied territories] knows well that the chances he will have to account for a serious crime committed against Palestinian residents of the [occupied territories] ... are minute.

[JURIST] US military contractor CACI International [corporate website] is allegedly responsible for the torture of more than 250 former detainees held in Iraqi prisons, according to the amended complaint [complaint, PDF] filed Tuesday in a class action lawsuit [CCR materials] pending in US federal court. According to a press release [text] from the Center for Constitutional Rights:

The complaint alleges that these victims were repeatedly sodomized, threatened with rape and harm to their family members, stripped naked, kept naked in their cells, chained and handcuffed to the bars of their cells, forced to wear women's panties on their heads and bodies, subjected to electric shock, subjected to extreme heat and cold, attacked by unmuzzled dogs, subjected to serious pain inflicted on sensitive body parts, and kicked, beaten and struck.

CACI employees did not play a limited, passive, or secondary role in this torture, according to the complaint. Rather, two CACI interrogators – Stephen Stefanowicz (known as "Big Steve") and Daniel Johnson (known as "DJ") – were viewed as among the most aggressive. These two men were responsible for directing former U.S. military personnel Charles Graner, Ivan Frederick, and others to torture and abuse prisoners. Indeed, CACI employees Big Steve and DJ directed such harsh torture that both Graner and Frederick, who were convicted and sentenced, respectively, to 10 and 8 years in prison for abusing prisoners, refused to follow the CACI directives to torture prisoners.

From day one, CACI has rejected the outrageous allegations of this lawsuit and will continue to do so. CACI has unequivocally renounced any abuse of detainees in Iraq and has cooperated fully in all government inquiries relating to detainee abuse. CACI does not condone or tolerate illegal or inappropriate behavior by any employee when engaged in CACI business and has repeatedly stated it would take swift action if the evidence demonstrates culpable wrongdoing by any of its employees. However, CACI also emphasizes its strong commitment to the fundamental American principle that people are presumed innocent until proven guilty.

The accusations in the self-proclaimed "victims" ever-changing lawsuit are a rehash of their original baseless submissions. The attempt by plaintiffs' counsel to portray CACI as engaged in a conspiracy to abuse detainees is unmitigated fiction perpetrated by plaintiffs' counsel as part of their "big lie" propaganda campaign to keep their lawsuit afloat and their personal political agendas in the public light. The plaintiffs are attempting to prosecute the same restated, reformulated and related claims that were frivolous when first filed and which remain to this day frivolous and maliciously false.

[JURIST] The number of executions in the US in 2007 reached the lowest level in 13 years, according to the 2007 year-end report [PDF text; press release] issued by the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) [advocacy website] on Tuesday. DPIC reported that there were 42 executions carried out in 2007, compared to 53 in 2006 and 98 in 1998, the highest number since reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. In 1994, there were 31 executions. The report also notes that the 110 death penalty sentences issued in 2007 was the lowest of any year since reinstatement.

The report attributes some of the drop in death penalty sentences and executions to the Supreme Court's decision in September granting certiorari [JURIST report] in Baze v. Rees (07-5439) [docket; cert. petition], a case where the Court will consider whether lethal injections of death row inmates constitute cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. Lawyers for death row inmate Baze argue that the three-drug mixture [DPIC backgrounder] used in Kentucky and many other states constitutes cruel and unusual punishment because the first drug fails to make the inmate fully unconscious, thereby making the inmate suffer excruciating pain when the heart-stopping drug is injected. Since the US Supreme Court accepted the Baze case, courts have stayed executions in Texas, Arizona, Nevada, Virginia, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida [JURIST reports]. The New York Times has more.

[JURIST] At least four White House lawyers participated in discussions about whether the CIA should destroy videotapes showing the interrogation of terror suspects [JURIST news archive], the New York Times reported Wednesday. It had previously been reported that Harriet Miers, who became White House counsel in 2005, had participated in internal discussions on what to do with the interrogation videos, but based on information from former and current administration and intelligence officials, the Times reported that Alberto Gonzales, who served as White House Counsel before becoming attorney general in 2005, former counsel to the vice president and his current chief of staff David Addington, and John Bellinger, formerly the top lawyer at the National Security Council and currently the State Department's legal adviser, also took part in the discussions. It is not clear whether the lawyers supported destroying the videotapes; Miers reportedly was opposed to their destruction. The Times' sources also said that the order to destroy the tapes came from the former head of the CIA's clandestine branch, Jose A. Rodriguez, Jr., who was acting on the written legal advice by two CIA lawyers [JURIST report]. Rodriguez did not tell acting CIA general counsel John Rizzo or then-Director Porter Goss before he issued the order. The New York Times has more.

Current CIA Director Michael Hayden acknowledged [statement text] earlier this month that the CIA had videotaped the interrogation of two al Qaeda suspects in 2002, but said that the tapes had been destroyed in 2005 amid concerns that they could be leaked to the public and compromise the identities of the interrogators. Several investigations have been launched into the tapes' destruction, including a joint DOJ-CIA preliminary investigation [JURIST report] and multiple congressional inquiries.