Two years after an Israeli-operated bulldozer crushed their daughter in the Gaza Strip, Cindy and Craig Corrie were frustrated by the lack of answers in their daughter's death. They felt that they had exhausted all other avenues and that their only choice to keep the publicity coming was to file a lawsuit.
On Monday, their case, filed in 2005 against Caterpillar Inc., which made the bulldozer, will be heard in Seattle by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
| Oh great, the 9th Circus, the fix is in. |
"It was only because of our frustrations to get some kind of accountability and find out what happened," Cindy Corrie said.
In March 2003, Rachel 'Pancake' Corrie, 23, spent part of the winter quarter of her senior year at The Evergreen State College serving with the International Solidarity Movement, members of which were acting as idiots fools rubes rustics goofs human shields in Rafah, Gaza, between Israeli bulldozers and Palestinian arms-smuggling tunnels disguised as homes. On March 16, one of the muted-green machines loudly approached the home where Corrie was living. She stood between the bulldozer and the home, armed with a bullhorn and wearing a bright orange jacket, which were not enough to stop the 50 tons of steel.
| Takes more than an orange jacket to stop 50 tons, eh? |
The Israeli military police investigated and determined that her death was an accident. Caterpillar, which is based in Illinois, argued that it couldn't be held responsible for how its equipment is used by others.
U.S. District Judge Franklin Burgess dismissed the family's initial lawsuit in November 2005, on the grounds that it interfered with foreign policy and that "selling products to a foreign government does not make the seller a participant in that government's alleged international law violations." The family appealed.
The lawsuit claims that for 40 years Caterpillar sold bulldozers to the Israeli army to be used to destroy homes. Since at least 2001, the company knew these activities were unlawful under the Geneva Conventions and often resulted in the death of civilians, the lawsuit claims.
| Which Geneva Conventions -- the ones we signed or the ones we didn't? |
Like those who supplied poisonous gas for the Nazis' gas chambers, Caterpillar should be held accountable, attorney Maria LaHood said Friday. She is part of the team of lawyers from the communist Center for Constitutional Rights in New York and Seattle University who are handling the case.
"I think it will send a message to corporations," Craig Corrie said Friday. "It may change the conversations around the boardroom."
Caterpillar's lead lawyer did not return phone calls or e-mails, but the company's Web site does address the issue in a June 13 message to its shareholders and the media. "Caterpillar fully complies with all local, U.S. and international laws and policies governing sales of our products around the world, including the U.S. Foreign Military Sales Program," the message says. "In addition, we clearly have neither the legal right nor the tangible ability to regulate how customers use their machines."
According to court papers, Caterpillar's lawyers responded to the Corries' lawsuit, saying, "Israel's purchase of bulldozers from Caterpillar are part of the military aid to Israel approved by the Executive and Legislative branches of government."
The State Department filed a brief in support of Caterpillar, arguing among other things that the case was rightfully dismissed because of foreign policy concerns. |
