Precedent Setting
Chicago ruling on West Bank killing seen as a blow to terror supporters.
RON KAMP EAS
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Washington
jury award of $156 million to
an Israeli-American family
whose son was killed in the
West Bank strikes a precedent that
could cripple U.S. fund-raising for ter-
rorism, la\vyers for the plaintiffs said.
The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks
were a key element leading to the
award this month against three chari-
ties and an individual for their com-
plicity in the 1996 murder in Israel of
17-year-old David Boim, attorney
Alyza Lewin said.
Judicial and government attitudes to
the suit, filed more than a year earlier,
changed dramatically after those attacks.
"We sued all these groups in a pre-
9-11 world," Lewin said.
After the attacks, the government
filed an amicus brief in the Boims'
suit, and other victims' families cited
it in filing similar cases. The two rul-
ings could have far-reaching implica-
tions, including for hundreds of Sept.
11 plaintiffs who have filed a trillion-
dollar lawsuit against Saudi charities
and others with American assets and
for plaintiffs who have sued the Arab
Bank for alleged links to terrorist
funds.
The lawsuit in the Sept. 11 attacks
"is based on our legal theory, and our
case has been cited in numerous ter-
rorist indictments," Lewin said.
A jury ruled Dec. 8 in a Chicago
federal courthouse against the Islamic
Association for Palestine, the Holy
Land Foundation for Relief and
Development, the Quranic Literacy
Institute and Muhammad Salah.
On trial in the preceding days was
the Quranic Literacy Institute. U.S.
Magistrate Arlander Keys had found
the other three parties liable in a sum-
mary judgment in November.
"I think the precedent is enormous,"
said Michael Kotzin, executive vice
president of the Jewish Federation of
Metropolitan Chicago.
"I think if nothing else, any other .
organizations that are doing this thing
hopefully will stop altogether. If not,
they will be a lot more careful," said
Kotzin, who, along with local col-
leagues, had been monitoring the pro-
A
ceedings closely.
"We are certain that many of the
donors to these organizations had no
intent that their dollars would be used
this way. But now we have had a rul-
ing by a federal judge that says
unequivocally that these are Hamas
supporters, Kotzin said.
"We're fighting a war against terror-
ism, and one of the ways to fight it is
to dry up a source of funds, to be
ready to identify the supporters, and
that has happened."
Groundbreaking Act
The case marked the first time the
1990 Federal Anti-Terrorism Act had
been used to go after U.S.-based chari-
ties that fund terrorism.
"Our main purpose was to slow
these groups and shut them down,
Lewin told JTA.
But she also saw long-term implica-
tions.
"People should be more careful —
and are as a result of this lawsuit being
more careful — about where they give
their money."
"
terror legislation beyond the perpetra-
tors — was a long shot. The defen-
dants were confident it would be
thrown out.
An appeals court hearing on Sept. 25,
two weeks after the Sept. 11
2001
attacks — was the first sign that the
new reality in America meant the Bolin's
case would get a different hearing.
"The court of appeals realized there
was 'added significance," Lewin said.
That was reinforced over the subse-
quent months through two govern-
ment decisions: President Bush froze
Holy Land's assets; and the Justice
Department filed an amicus brief in
the case.
In November, Keys issued summary
judgments against three of the four
defendants.
"The court is persuaded that no
genuine issues of fact exist and that no
reasonable jury could, on the record
before the court, find in favor" of the
Islamic Association for Palestine, Keys
said in one of the rulings of his 108-
page judgment.
He said that only the case against
—
"It takes money to buy the gun that killed David
Boim, to train the terrorists that killed him, to
indoctrinate others into lives of terrorism and to
provide for the terrorists' families."
—Boim famly attorney Stephen Landes
As the verdict was announced, Joyce
Boim nodded her head as if to signal
her approval. Her son David, who was
killed in a drive-by shooting as he
stood at a bus stop, had hoped to
become a doctor, and the trial includ-
ed testimony about the potential value
of David's life if he had lived to
achieve his dream.
"Maybe it's a drop in the bucket with
the entire Hamas organization, but at
least we have stopped some money
used to buy bombs and bullets that
blow up children," his mother said.
When the Boims filed suit in 2000,
legal experts thought their case — the
first that sought to expand the anti-
Quranic Literacy Institute raised
enough doubts to merit a trial by jury
that also would assess damages.
He ordered a December trial and
denied the charity its request for a
continuance. The group is considering
an appeal.
The total jury award was $52 mil-
lion, which the judge automatically
trebled under federal statutes. An
economist had testified that if David
Boim had become a physician, he
could have earned anywhere from $4
million to $20 million in his lifetime.
The Boims, who have lived in Israel
since 1985, also sought an additional
$6 million for mental anguish.
Three of the four parties have had
their assets frozen by the federal gov-
ernment, while a fourth group — the
Islamic Association for Palestine — is
believed to have minimal assets.
Lewin said she was confident some
assets could be recovered for the plain-
tiffs, especially since the liable organi-
zations were American.
The U.S. government has stopped
payment in past cases when courts
found foreign nations liable in ordering
terrorist attacks and ordered U.S. assets
seized. But that is not the case here.
And that was not the point, Lewin
said. Such charities "should be exposed
for what they are and shut down," she
said.
During the trial, both Stanley and
Joyce Boim delivered emotional testi-
mony describing their pain after their
son was murdered. On Dec. 8, before
the verdict was delivered,- Stanley
Boim read psalms in the courtroom.
Matthew Levitt, a counterterrorism
expert at the Washington Institute for
Near East Policy and a former FBI
analyst, testified at the trial, outlining
a money trail that led from a million-
aire Saudi businessman to Hamas via
the Quranic Literacy Institute, which
gave cover and legitimacy to Salah, an
employee and Hamas operative.
In 1992, Salah was sent to Israel to
rebuild the leadership of Hamas, which
had been gutted by the deportation of
400 Hamas members to Lebanon.
Salah later was convicted in Israel for
supplying money to the terrorist group.
During closing arguments, Stephen
Landes, another of the attorneys repre-
senting the Boim family, called the
three Islamic charitable groups the
oxygen that keeps the terror support
system going.
"It takes money to buy the gun that
killed David Boim, to train the terror-
ists that killed him, to indoctrinate
others into lives of terrorism and to
provide for the terrorists' families
when the terrorists are jailed or com-
mit suicide," Landes said.
"They beat the drums for terror-
ism," Landes said of the defendants.
"They were the publicists." 1-1
Chicago-based freelancers Daniel I.
Dorfman and Lisa Pevtzow contributed
to this story.
12/24
2004
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