Supreme Court Detainee Decision May Not Block Suits Against Top Officials

Washington Independent:

In denying the right of a Muslim Pakistani immigrant to sue former Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI director Robert Mueller for his prolonged imprisonment and harsh treatment based on his religion and national origin, the Supreme Court on Monday raised the bar for plaintiffs seeking to sue high-level government officials for policies carried out by their subordinates.

The decision has been cited by some in the media as blocking the right to sue a public official for wrongful detention or mistreatment. In fact, the decision was tailored narrowly, leaving the door open to such suits in the future. Yet it remains unclear how specific the plaintiff's claims must be for a court to allow the case to proceed against high-level officials who condone unconstitutional practices.

Read the whole story: Washington Independent

Comments

[medici]

It looks like dubya appointed Roberts and Alito to the Supreme Court so as to have a "Get out of jail free" card.

[abouttime]

The main stream media are lap dogs for their corporate bosses.
Boycott MSM. Listen, watch and read alternative public media owned exclusively by the people!
Listen to Democracy Now!
Read Indymedia on-line.
Check out international news.
It's up to We, the People!
It is our right and duty.

[AnotherAndy]

blairtone, Member Since May 2009

[1dogs2]

Of all the inaccuracies in media reporting, none are more frequent than reports on judicial opinions. Nice that it only took a day to correct this one.

[felisa11]

cited by some in the media as inaccurate and not the full story. This happens daily!

People read it and take it as gospel word for word and is completely outraged by it.

everyone should take their daily news with a little salt and much more followup, including myself

[blairtone]

especially as regards this site, DailyKos, Newsweek, Time, NYTimes, LA Times, etc. etc

[broncofan]

So Dick Cheney's $100 million he made-mostly through Halliburton- could be on the table. Now it makes sense Liz is coming to her Dad's defense and the reason why Cheney has gone 'public' when while he was VP he could have given a rat's ass what anyone thought. IIt would be justice that what he did to America is going to paid for by his family.

[vippy]

Unbelievable! As long as it is not me, why should I care? Imagine being detained and incarcerated for 4 years and subject to all kinds of torture. Health problems develop, mental problems develop and you cannot sue?

[blairtone]

After all,he was an innocent victim - his mummy didn't love him! Dear oh dear - imagine being thrown in jail just because you were convicted of fraud. No, no, no - sue Cheney - it's his fault the guy committed fraud.

[JuergenHartl]

Cheney did not commit fraud - he committed WAR CRIMES. And YES he needs to be investigated for that

[JuergenHartl]

So - next it will be OK to be held in custody for years under "harsh conditions" (i.e torture) for traffic violations?