Judge OKs Torture-related Suit Against Former White House Lawyer

By Evan Mix

Published on June 25, 2009

A judge ruled last week that John C. Yoo, currently a law professor at UC Berkeley's School of Law, cannot be held immune from charges leveled against him in a civil rights lawsuit filed by a detainee. The judge rejected all but one of Yoo's claims of immunity, a decision that was hailed as potentially groundbreaking by lawyers for the prosecution.

The suit was filed by Jose Padilla, a Brooklyn-born Muslim who was classified as an enemy combatant and held in solitary confinement for three years. He was subsequently convicted of supporting terrorism and other crimes, and is serving a 17-year sentence. Padilla alleges that during his time in solitary confinement, he was subjected to "gross physical and psychological abuse" that has been described as torture by some experts. Padilla seeks just $1 in monetary damages, and a declaration by the court that his treatment was unconstitutional.

Yoo and his lawyers have not commented since the decision, but he criticized the suit in an article he wrote for the Wall Street Journal, saying, "The legal system should not be used as a bludgeon against individuals targeted by political activists to impose policy preferences they have failed to implement via the ballot box."

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