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Thomas Jefferson Law Professor Testifies About Post-9/11 Prisoners

During testimony in Washington, D.C., last week before a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee, Thomas Jefferson School of Law professor Marjorie Cohn raised legal issues associated with the interrogations of Guantanamo Bay prison detainees.

Cohn, who also serves as president of the National Lawyers Guild, is author of the book “Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law,” a critical analysis of the invasion and occupation of Iraq and various administration polices on subjects such as torture, war crimes and the surveillance of American citizens.

Cohn testified alongside London law professor Philippe Sands, author of “Lawless World,” which accused President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair for conspiring to invade Iraq in violation of international law; Baker & Hostetler partner David Rivkin Jr., who served as a White House lawyer in the Reagan administration; and Georgetown University law professor David Luban.

The panel of witnesses agreed that a “ticking time bomb” did not exist to justify harsh interrogation techniques approved in legal memos by the Bush administration.

“Torture is always illegal,” Cohn said in an interview after the hearing. “Yet the lawyers in the Justice Department of legal counsel, including John Yoo, David Addington and William Haynes, wrote memos that narrowed the definition of torture far beyond what our law allows.”

Last month, the Justice and Defense departments released a secret memo written by Yoo, former deputy assistant attorney general, which outlined the legal justification for military interrogators to use harsh tactics against al-Qaida and Taliban detainees overseas , so long as the interrogators didn’t specifically intend to torture their captives.

Shortly after the memo’s release, the National Lawyers Guild called for Yoo to be tried as a war criminal and for his employer, UC Berkeley’s School of Law, to dismiss him for conspiring to facilitate the commission of war crimes.

The guild also called on Congress to repeal a provision of the Military Commissions Act that would give Yoo immunity from prosecution for torture committed from Sept. 11, 2001, to Dec. 30, 2005.

The Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties said it intended to hear further testimony from key players, including Addington, Yoo and former Attorney General John Ashcroft, in future hearings.

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Research Report On Patents:

Research released early this month by European law firm Taylor Wessing puts into perspective how the world’s leading economies fare in terms of protecting and enforcing intellectual property.

The survey, called the Global Intellectual Property Index, rated 22 countries in terms of how well copyrights, patents and trademarks are obtained, exploited, enforced and attacked.

The United States, United Kingdom and Germany ranked in the top tier, while Australia, Canada, France, New Zealand, Singapore and the Netherlands fell into the second tier.

According to the survey, the U.K. scored favorably for obtaining and exploiting trademarks, whereas the U.S. rated highly in enforcing and exploiting copyrights. Litigation in Germany, meanwhile, was seen as relatively inexpensive and quick.

Although China was rated last, many respondents saw it as improving.


Send news about legal services to Heather Chambers, hchambers@sdbj.com.

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