John C. Yoo Should Be Disbarred

Justice has coming looking for Mr. Yoo. It’s a start.  Testify under oath. Be subject to civil penalties for deprivation of civil rights. It’s a start. I am guessing Mr. Yoo is wondering if he was a pawn. He’s apparently a very smart guy, you would think the consequences of his work might have crossed his mind when he was “researching” how to craft memos to justify harsh interrogation tools that the US has previously prosecuted as war crimes.

clipped from www.nytimes.com Judge Allows Civil Lawsuit Over Claims of Torture The decision issued late Friday by a judge in San Francisco allowing a civil lawsuit to go forward against a former Bush administration official, John C. Yoo, might seem like little more than the removal of a procedural roadblock. But lawyers for the man suing Mr. Yoo, Jose Padilla, say it provides substantive interpretation of constitutional issues for all detainees and could have a broad impact. During the time Mr. Padilla was held in the brig, according to his filings in the case, he “suffered gross physical and psychological abuse at the hands of federal officials as part off a systematic program of abusive interrogation intended to break down Mr. Padilla’s humanity and his will to live.” Judge White, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, rejected all but one of Mr. Yoo’s immunity claims and found that Mr. Padilla “has alleged sufficient facts to satisfy the requirement that Yoo set in motion a series of events that resulted in the deprivation of Padilla’s constitutional rights.” Tahlia Townsend, one of Mr. Padilla’s lawyers, called it “a significant victory for American values, government accountability and our system of checks and balances.” Mr. Padilla’s legal team also included students from Yale Law School’s international human rights clinic.

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