Torture instigators George Bush and Dick Cheney should not
be allowed to evade prosecution on grounds they acted in good faith on their
lawyers' advice because they told their lawyers what advice to give.
"Could Al Capone or 'Lucky' Luciano receive immunity for acting in accordance
with the advice of counsel when they told counsel what to advise?" asks
Lawrence Velvel, dean of the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover .
"(Vice-President) Cheney and (President) Bush knew that they were ordering
violations of law," Velvel points out. "The fact that they were doing so, and
were well aware they were doing so, was one of the reasons why they, like a
significant number of CIA officials who knew the same, demanded that lawyers
produce legal cover for them in the form of Office of Legal Counsel memos
authored by the likes of (John) Yoo and (Steven) Bradbury."
Lower level CIA and military personnel that did not read the supposedly
exculpatory memos, Velvel said, also cannot claim reliance on legal counsel
because "they had to know that torture was forbidden no matter what some
lawyers said. You could not grow up in America and not know this" any more than
a person could claim murder was lawful because some lawyer told him so, Velvel
writes.
"They knew what they were doing was wrong," he continued. "FBI...guys on the
scene knew it regardless of what lawyers like Yoo said, and it was knowledge
that what they were doing was wrong that caused some lower level CIA guys too
to want a 'get out of jail free card,'" Velvel writes.
"That realization is why CIA officials, from 2002 to 2006 or 2007 demanded
memoranda from the Office of Legal Counsel of the Department of Justice,
falsely claiming that the abuse and torture were not criminal acts," Velvel
said. "The officials wanted these OLC memos so that they could later avoid or
defeat prosecutions by claiming that the decision-making office of the DOJ had
approved the legality of what they were doing. The officials wanted a 'golden
shield,'" he added.
Those who claim they were ordered to torture, like those who said they had a
legal opinion that to do so was okay, are guilty of an effort to "escape the
Nuremberg principles by saying that others said what the culprits were doing
was okay," Velvel continues. The Nuremberg tribunal that judged accused Nazi
war criminals after World War Two concluded they could not evade guilt by
asserting they were only following orders.
"But claiming that their actions were immune because others okayed them is
precisely what Cheney, Bush, their whole crowd...have been attempting to do... They
knew what they were doing was illegal, as evidenced by the extreme secrecy they
practiced lest it be learned they were practicing, and lest they be accused of
practicing, the crimes they were in fact practicing. Morality, decency, and
Nuremberg alike forbid this."
"By now it seems beyond serious doubt that George Bush and company committed
numerous war crimes," Velvel wrote. "It is evident that if these things can be
done, then there is an end of law where the truly wealthy and powerful are
concerned. Whether it is Al Capone or Dick Cheney, the filthy rich or obscenely
powerful will have it in their power to do the most awful things yet escape the
law by using contributions or power to obtain immunity from preexisting law and
to buy the opinions of immoral lawyers. That is the moral and philosophical
basis why these things can't be permitted," Velvel said.
Velvel is dean of the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, founded in 1988
for the express purpose of providing a quality, affordable legal education to
minority students, immigrants and students from low-income backgrounds who
would otherwise not be able to afford law school.
(Sherwood Ross is a media consultant to the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover. Reach him at sherwoodr1@yahoo.com)
