Source: https://www.clearinghouse.net/detail.php?id=9577&amp;search=
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 06:32:30+00:00

Document:
Turkmen v. Ashcroft is one of two related actions filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York by plaintiffs who were investigated and detained for suspected terrorist ties in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. A potential but uncertified class action suit, this case was filed on April 17, 2002 and assigned to Judge Gleeson.
The related case, Elmaghraby v. Ashcroft (also assigned to Judge Gleeson), was settled following a ruling by the Supreme Court in Ashcroft v. Iqbal. 556 U.S. 662.
Turkmen v. Ashcroft is a lawsuit brought against former Attorney General John Ashcroft, FBI Director Robert Mueller, former INS Commissioner James Ziglar, and employees of the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, New York. The suit charges that on the pretext of minor immigration violations, the Immigration and Naturalization Service unlawfully held the plaintiffs—all men from Arab or South Asian countries— in detention for the months that the FBI took to clear them of links to terrorism, long after the time their immigration cases were completed. The complaint alleges that Defendants violated the detainees' rights under the First, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments and under international human rights law. The case was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The eight named plaintiffs include Muslims from Pakistan, Egypt, Algeria and Turkey, as well as a Hindu man born in India and a Buddhist from Nepal. Despite the fact that the government has never charged any of the plaintiffs with connections to terrorism, the INS kept them in detention for up to nine months. Instead of being presumed innocent until proven guilty, they and hundreds of other post-9/11 detainees were presumed guilty of terrorism until proven innocent to the satisfaction of law enforcement authorities. The suit further charges that some of these detainees were improperly assigned to the Administrative Maximum Special Housing Unit (ADMAX SHU); kept in solitary confinement with the lights on all day; placed under a communications blackout so that they could not seek the assistance of their attorneys, families, and friends; subjected to physical and verbal abuse; forced to endure inhumane conditions of confinement; and obstructed in their efforts to practice their religion. The plaintiffs seek compensatory and punitive damages. [ Accessed 10/29/14].
The plaintiffs also alleged violations of the Sixth Amendment; the Alien Tort Statute; and the Federal Tort Claims Act ("FTCA"). Factually, the plaintiffs alleged that they were subjected to delayed service of notices to appear and a blanket no bond policy, and were also arbitrarily classified as "of high interest" targets. Once detained, they claimed they were subjected to unlawful conditions of confinement which included strip searches, sleep deprivation, constructive denial of exercise, denial of hygiene items and adequate food, inadequate medical attention, deliberate interference with religious rights, communications blackouts, interference with access to counsel, denial of consular right, and failure to provide handbooks. The plaintiffs further alleged that they were subjected to these harsh conditions because they were Muslim Arabs and that their continued detention under these conditions stemmed from a discriminatory policy created by high-level officials in the Bush Administration.
The plaintiffs later amended their complaint in light of DOJ Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reports published in April and December 2003. Those amendments added new allegations, the FTCA claims, one additional plaintiff, and 28 MDC employees as defendants.
Four plaintiffs who had been deported were paroled into the U.S. to be deposed. This was the first time non-citizens barred from re-entering the U.S. were allowed to enter for the purpose of pursuing a civil case. While in the country they were under the strict custody of the U.S. Marshall Service.
In 2007, the DOJ indicted eleven current and former MDC employees, including three of the Turkmen defendants. Ten of the eleven were convicted of physical attacks against MDC detainees (not including the plaintiffs here).
Following the 2009 Supreme Court ruling in Ashcroft v. Iqbal, six of the plaintiffs settled their claims for $1.26 million. The fourth amended complaint (September 13, 2010) added six other plaintiffs and attempted to meet the pleading standard set in Iqbal, to maintain claims against Ashcroft and other high-ranking officials.
On January 15, 2013, Judge Gleeson dismissed the claims against Ashcroft, Mueller, and Ziglar (the "DOJ defendants") and dismissed two of the claims against the other five defendants (the "MDC defendants"). Those two claims, based on alleged communications blackout and interference with counsel, were dismissed on the ground of qualified immunity.
The plaintiffs collectively and the MDC defendants individually appealed the ruling to the Second Circuit. The appeals were consolidated as Case No. 13-1662. The case was heard on May 1, 2014.
On June 17, 2015, the Court filed its opinion on the case, affirming in part, denying in part, and remanding the case to the district court for further action consistent with the Court opinion. The Court affirmed the plaintiffs’ due process, equal protection, Fourth Amendment, and §1983 conspiracy claims, but denied their free exercise claim. In doing so, the Court championed two major changes: first, extending the application of a Bivens action to the Attorney General and the FBI Director for their policy decisions post-9/11, “a context not previously recognized by the Supreme Court or Second Circuit precedent.” 789 F.3d 218 (2d Cir. 2015). Second, the Court denied that qualified immunity defenses applied to the DOJ and MDC defendants regarding the plaintiffs’ claims of punitive and discriminatory confinement and unreasonable strip searches after the defendants learned that the plaintiffs were being detained without individual suspicion of terrorist connections.
Following the Court’s decision, the defendants petitioned for a rehearing en banc, but were denied. They subsequently moved for a 90-day stay of the Court’s mandate (from December 11, 2015 to March 10, 2016) while the Solicitor General reviewed the case and decided whether or not to petition for certiorari. The Court granted the stay, and the Supreme Court granted cert, issuing a decision on June 19, 2017.
In Ziglar v. Abbasi, the Supreme Court reversed in part, vacated, and remanded in part. Regarding the Second Circuit's extension of Bivens to the plaintiffs' detention policy claims, the Court held that, "[c]onsidering the relevant special factors here, a Bivens-type remedy should not be extended..." and that "Congress, not the courts, should decide whether a damages action should be allowed." 137 S.Ct. 1843, 1848-49. The Court further held that the plaintiffs' prisoner abuse allegations against the MDC defendants did state a plausible ground to find a violation of the Fifth Amendment, but remanded for the lower courts to consider whether a Bivens remedy would be implied in such a context. Finally, the Court held the defendants were entitled to qualified immunity with respect to the plaintiffs' §1983 claims.
The Second Circuit remanded the case to the District Court for consideration in light of the Supreme Court's decision. On February 27, 2018, the District Court dismissed the plaintiffs' claims against the individual DOJ defendants and referred the balance of plaintiffs' claims to the magistrate.
The MDC defendants moved to dismiss the case for failure to state a claim in light of Ziglar v. Abbasi. On August 13, 2018, the magistrate issued a report, recommending that the plaintiffs' claims against the MDC defendants be dismissed. The magistrate concluded that Congress is in "the best position to weigh the costs and benefits of allowing a cause of action to proceed" under Bivens in the context of the plaintiffs' prisoner abuse claims.
The plaintiffs have since filed objections to the report, and the case is ongoing as of October 16, 2018.

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