I saw this on Mia Culpa but not on GMD so here goes. We all know Blackwater USA is a whore of the M-I complex, bilking billions of our taxpayer dollars to defend dignitaries and U.S. government officials while carusing in Iraq. Their only concern is making money and forget the welfare of those that they hire in the process.
A frenzied mob of insurgents ambushed Paauilo resident Wesley J.K. Batalona, Scott Helvenston, Jerko “Jerry” Zovko, and Michael R. Teague in March 2004 as they escorted a supply convoy through Fallujah, Iraq.
You also most likely remember the bridge outside Falluja on March 31, 2004. The story was shown all over the world and mortified the nation and most importantly the families of those contractors. The families sued Blackwater for not honoring an agreement to provide armored vehicles, resulting in a lawsuit that was stalled repeatedly with a resolution still undetermined.
Now Blackwater is filing a countersuit, but not against the families specifically.
Crossposted at Joshing Politics
From Mia Culpa:
Blackwater USA has filed a $10 million dollar lawsuit against the attorney representing the families of four American contractors who were killed, and hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River by insurgents in Fallujah, Iraq in March of 2004. Blackwater claims that the suit filed by the families of the deceased men for wrongful death in January of 2005 is a violation of the security guard’s contracts with the private military contractor and security firm.
Richard Nordan, the estates administrator who filed the suit against Blackwater is specifically named in the suit, and not the family members of the deceased, or their estates. Blackwater has also asked to have a federal court send the matter into arbitration, after failing to have the suits dismissed.
Even if their contracts had stipulated this the countersuit would still be a disgrace to those that lost their lives in such a graphic manner that day. Only their suit is far from being honest.
Investigations into the deaths revealed that it was small arms fire, not explosives as originally reported, that killed the men. Armored vehicles would have protected them, and their families and attorney believe that they would still be alive today had that original contractual obligation been met. The contracts also called for the men to travel in 6 person teams, and team leader Justin McQuown — who according to Scott Helvenston’s own emails had a rather adversarial relationship — decided to hold two men back for clerical duties, and sent just the four doomed contractors off to Fallujah, sans armored protection. In one of Helvenston’s last emails to Blackwater, he spoke of McQuown having a possible hidden agenda that he referred to as “Let’s see if we can screw with Scott.”
The legal battle for the family members seems to have begun with the Blackwater memorial service for the dead held at the Blackwater compound. Afterwards, while gathered in a conference room, when the relatives of Jerry Zovko asked to see the after-action report detailing the last moments of his life, Zovco’s mother Danica said the response was “that if we wanted to see the paperwork of how my son and his co-workers were killed that we’d have to sue them.”
Well the families did file a suit in court and Blackwater fought it.
From the CNN article:
Blackwater has filed a motion to dismiss the case, providing copies of contracts signed by the four saying they would assume any risks from working under “volatile, hostile and extremely dangerous circumstances.”
The only problem is that Blackwater did not show the agreement that the contractors should have been equipped with armored vehicles. Another issue with the dismissal and countersuit was that Blackwater USA did not want people knowing they were over-billing the U.S. government and then signed a sub-contract that deleted the word “armored” from the contract. Thankfully the judge reinstated the case in November, but Blackwater reacted with their countersuit.
The families see this as a shock and awe tactic:
“The $10 million is a scare tactic,” said Katy Helvenston, mother of Scott Helvenston. “I’m not concerned about that at all because the whole thing’s a farce. It’s just another excuse to delay.”
Of course we shouldn’t be surprised at this. Just move along, don’t look at the corruption and malfeasance. No one certainly did in Congress from 2004 to 2006. Now with our Democratic Congress, I pray that oversight and accountability finds that Blackwater USA is a disgusting war-profiteering outfit that needs serious investigations and justice for the families that have been affected by the company’s negligence.
