Only in US of FA !!! Family of protester killed by bulldozer suing Caterpillar

[directfiesta]

OK, I think that what the Israeli soldiers did was awfull, and they should have been punished ( I had started a thread on this when it happened).

But to sue Caterpillar !!!! Amazing....

Mar 15, 2005 : 6:29 pm ET

SEATTLE -- The parents of a 23-year-old activist killed while trying to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home is suing Caterpillar Inc., the company that made the bulldozer that ran over her.

The federal lawsuit, which lawyers said would be filed here Tuesday, alleges that Caterpillar violated international and state law by providing specially designed bulldozers to Israeli Defense Forces that it knew would be used to demolish homes and endanger people.

Rachel Corrie, a student at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, was standing in front of a home in a refugee camp in Rafah, near the Egyptian border, on March 16, 2003, when a bulldozer plowed over her.

"The brutal death of my daughter should never have happened," Corrie's mother, Cindy Corrie of Charlotte, N.C., said in a statement released by the Center for Constitutional Rights, a law firm handling the case. "We believe Caterpillar and the (Israeli Defense Forces) must be held accountable for their role in the attack."

Caterpillar spokeswoman Linda Fairbanks said the company had no comment on the lawsuit.

However, the company released a general, written statement Tuesday that said: "Caterpillar shares the world's concern over unrest in the Middle East and we certainly have compassion for all those affected by political strife.

"However, more than 2 million Caterpillar machines and engines are at work in virtually every region of the world each day. We have neither the legal right nor the means to police individual use of that equipment."

The statement did not refer to the lawsuit.

The Corries have filed separate claims in Israel against the state of Israel, the Israeli Defense Ministry and the Israeli Defense Forces.

The Israeli military classified Corrie's death as an accident.

Maybe McDonald will be sued for feeding the IDF ...

http://www.heraldsun.com/state/6-586996.html

[spentrent]

The federal lawsuit, which lawyers said would be filed here Tuesday, alleges that Caterpillar violated international and state law by providing specially designed bulldozers to Israeli Defense Forces that it knew would be used to demolish homes and endanger people.

Not an abusrd claim, is it?

The Israeli military classified Corrie's death as an accident.

Well of course they would.

[jukeboxfrank]

90% of trial lawyers are dems.....And 85 % of all Americans think that this shit is stupid. + or - 2 %. Both the law suite and the bulldozing of homes by Israel.

[arg]

Bulldozing homes is argued by some as a war crime, and if Cat was producing equipment specifically to perpetrate war crimes, that could entail some legal liability. I'm not saying the court will agree with either premise (bulldozing houses being a war crime or designing tools for warcrimes incurring liability), but this doesn't sound like a completely baseless lawsuit, like suing a food maker that supplied soldiers (whether or not you're arguing that they're war criminals).

from the Geneva Convention:

"Art. 49. Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive."

[GiantGnome]

United States Of Florida?

[directfiesta]

Originally Posted by GiantGnome

United States Of Florida?

No...

United Stated of Fucking America