US District Judge Timothy Kelly has issued a decision in which he ordered Iran to pay $107 million in compensatory damages and $1.3 billion in punitive damages in the disappearance and potential torture of former FBI agent Robert Levinson.
The attorney argued this was fair for the “pain and suffering” of the family, saying Iran had “tortured the family in a way.” Not in a literal way, and potentially not even in a figurative way, since it’s not clear Iran was at all involved in this.
Levinson disappeared in 2007 while working for the CIA. There was a supposition at the time that he was in Iran, but while Iran has denied having anything to do with him, that supposition has just continued on until it became the basis for a huge lawsuit.
Him being imprisoned as an FBI/CIA guy for skulking around Iran is at least plausible, which would be the basis for this whole lawsuit. The attorney’s claim that Levinson was tortured, however, comes out of nowhere, since it’s not clear where Levinson was/is or what happened to him. The whole argument seems to be built on the assumption that it’s the sort of thing Iran probably would do.
The judgment probably won’t be paid anyhow, since it’s a US court and the US has frozen all of Iran’s assets. At most they might sell a seized Iranian building and use that money, but even that is unlikely.
Multiply that by the number of people killed when the US shot down the Iranian airliner and NEVER even apologized. That’s how much the US should pay.
C’mon, judge, the dude ain’t worth a plugged nickel.
This US-Iran stuff is just full blown insanity
Much more by one side than the other.
Silly pompous US legal wankery.
Some of it might be paid at the expense of Venezuelan farmers who had their fuel stolen so that rich families in the U.S. could gain at their expense.
But even if it is never paid the important thing is that it creates headlines to demonize Iran in the eyes of the U.S. public so that we are conditioned to believe that we are doing God’s work when we finally exterminate those vermin w/tactical nukes. And then a judge will order a lien against any future oil revenue to compensate Israel for the PTSD that watching such a horrible event caused them.
So a judge, Tim Kelly, who supposedly is guided by evidence, hands down a ruling lacking any basis in evidence? it is small wonder that our “judicial” system is a laughing-stock, both here and abroad.
Well, at least it wasn’t “waterboarding and worse”….
I suppose if that FBI agent had been visiting a neighboring country and Iran had blown him to bits with a drone, we’d be ok with that. Or is that reserved for generals?
Judgements against countries like N Korea and Iran seem to slam-dunks these days.
I am surprised they only awarded $1.3 Billion why not a $Trillion.