Thread: Courts Rule US Government Above the Law

Courts Rule US Government Above the Law

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... OBY_umvVrQ

Oct 18, 2011

TRANSCRIPT AND SOURCES: http://www.corbettreport.com/?p=2855

Manhattan Federal Judge Alvin Hellerstein has declined to hold the CIA in contempt for destroying videos that it had been ordered by the courts to preserve.

Courts Rule US Government Above the Law

Posted by Corbett

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... OBY_umvVrQ

James Corbett
GRTV.ca
18 October, 2011
many links on this post

Manhattan Federal Judge Alvin Hellerstein has declined to hold the CIA in contempt for destroying videos that it had been ordered by the courts to preserve.

The case revolves around 92 videos, depicting hundreds of hours of interrogations of detainees. The tapes allegedly contained evidence of torture, and the CIA was ordered by numerous courts to produce the videos in relation to lawsuits arising from torture allegations. The 9/11 Commission also demanded that the tapes be produced. Instead, the agency destroyed them.

Although the Obama Justice Department had already decided last year that no criminal charges would be filed for this blatant obstruction of justice, Judge Hellerstein’s recent ruling insures that the agency will not even face civil sanctions or so much as a contempt order for willfully breaking the law.

In his ruling, Judge Hellerstein, the very judge who had ordered the CIA to produce the tapes in September of 2004, notes that the agency had instead provided a description of what they say was on the tapes and “implemented new protocolsâ€