Filing: Shield officials from torture lawsuits

[unhappycamper]

Filing: Shield officials from torture lawsuits
By Nedra Pickler - The Associated Press
Posted : Friday Mar 13, 2009 15:11:14 EDT

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is trying to protect top Bush administration military officials from lawsuits brought by prisoners who say they were tortured while being held at Guantanamo Bay.

The Justice Department argued in a filing Thursday with the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia that holding military officials liable for their treatment of prisoners could cause them to make future decisions based on fear of litigation rather than appropriate military policy.

The Obama administration was expected to take another stand affecting Guantanamo detainees’ lawsuits Friday. A federal judge overseeing lawsuits of detainees challenging their detention has given the Justice Department until the close of business to give its definition of whom the United States may hold as an “enemy combatant.”

Obama has pledged to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility within a year, and Justice Department lawyers are already trying to find courtrooms or foreign countries to place the 240 people still held there.

The new administration is seeking to craft new rules for when and how a terror suspect can be seized, and what interrogation methods may be used in trying to extract information from them. But while it works on those rules, the Obama administration appears to be sticking with Bush administration legal definitions in pending litigation.


Rest of article at: http://armytimes.com/news/2009/03/ap_military_officials_lawsuits_031309/%2e