Lawyers Sanctioned After Accusing 2nd Circuit of Acquiescence in 9/11 Government Conspiracy
Three lawyers who claimed in a lawsuit that the United States allowed or aided the Sept. 11 attacks have been sanctioned $15,000 for appealing the suit’s dismissal and accusing a federal appeals panel of acquiescence in the government “conspiracy.”
The New York City-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sanctioned lawyers Dennis Cunningham, Mustapha Ndanusa and William Veale, holding them jointly and severally liable for the $15,000 sanction and ordering them also to pay the government double costs. The lawyers “piled one mistake on top of another on their way to being sanctioned,” the New York Law Journal reports in its coverage of the sanctions opinion (reg. req.) issued Friday.
Cunningham has since said he was principal author of the documents at issue in the sanctions case, according to the 2nd Circuit opinion imposing sanctions. The lawyers’ troubles began in April when the 2nd Circuit dismissed the Sept. 11 appeal filed on behalf of Pentagon worker April Gallop. At that time, the appeals court called the suit a “fantastical alternative history” and ordered the lawyers to show cause whey they should not be sanctioned.
A June 16 motion signed by Veale sought to disqualify the 2nd Circuit panel. The document alleged the judges displayed “evident severe bias” stemming from “active personal emotions arising from the 9/11 attack.” The motion said the claims in Gallop’s suit were so abhorrent that the judges’ “normal intellectual functions” were likely deactivated. Those allegations resulted in a second order to show cause.
The lawyers further irritated the 2nd Circuit in their response to the April order to show cause. According the 2nd Circuit, the response “presents only irrelevant information in a jarringly disorganized manner, united solely by its consistently patronizing tone.”
The lawyers’ response included “a robust collection of unsupported accusations of bias” against the 2nd Circuit panel, the opinion said. They included claims that the judges had engaged in “angry pre-judgment” and participated or at least acquiesced in an ongoing government “conspiracy” regarding the events of Sept. 11.
Ndanusa told the New York Law Journal he was shocked by the ruling and said Gallop’s case should have been allowed. “We don’t have in our possession all the facts that point to a conspiracy,” he told the legal publication. “We should be able to substantiate the conspiracy by having discovery.”
