Rasul v. Rumsfeld

The latest in a string of lawsuits challenging harsh interrogation techniques could fare better than similar cases.

Since my earlier post on Yaser Hamdi’s express agreement not to sue the United States for his indefinite detention and mistreatment, Cornell Law Professor Michael Dorf, who analyzed the Hamdi agreement shortly after it was reached, has provided a helpful clue as to why we may not be seeing more of these explicit waivers of [...]

In another move that suggests the Obama Department of Justice is not making many big policy breaks with its predecessor when it comes to the legal rights of Guantanamo Bay detainees, the department filed a brief renewing the government’s motion to dismiss the case of Rasul v. Rumsfeld.
The case is very similar to the lawsuit [...]

The US Supreme Court this morning granted certiorari in the case of Rasul v. Rumsfeld, Myers, et al., the first case in which plaintiffs who claim they were illegally detained, tortured and humiliated at Guantanamo Bay before they were released without charge have claimed civil damages against US officials. Instead of reviewing the case itself, [...]

As I wrote on Wednesday, there are already several lawsuits from torture victims pending against the United States, and some legal scholars predict many more to come. So what if an Obama-sponsored investigative commission set up a means for compensating torture victims? That could save the government a whole lot of money.
A slew of [...]