By PETE YOST
Associated Press 17 Dec 2010
Under a regulatory change that went in effect Dec. 7, attorneys working for free no longer have to obtain a license from the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control before representing clients who are placed on a terrorist list the office maintains.
The licensing requirement is designed to freeze terrorist assets and it still applies to attorneys who want to get paid out of frozen funds.
Last summer, attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights went to court to challenge the licensing requirement, saying it was making it impossible to file a lawsuit challenging the Obama administration program that has targeted al-Awlaki. OFAC quickly granted a license.
"The government should not have been using a program intended to freeze terrorist assets to control whether suspects could be represented by an attorney who was not getting paid," said Jonathan Manes, a national security lawyer at the ACLU.
Thought to be hiding in Yemen, al-Awlaki is believed to have helped inspire the Fort Hood, Texas, shootings, the Times Square bombing attempt and the failed Christmas Day bombing of a jetliner approaching Detroit.
OFAC added al-Awlaki to its terrorism blacklist July 16, freezing any bank accounts in the United States belonging to him and forbidding Americans from doing business with him.
On Dec. 7, the same day that the change in the regulation took effect, U.S. District Judge John Bates threw out the suit aimed at preventing the United States from targeting al-Awlaki for death. Bates said he does not have the authority to review the president's military decisions and that al-Awlaki's father does not have the legal right to sue to stop the United States from killing his son.
The licensing requirement is designed to freeze terrorist assets and it still applies to attorneys who want to get paid out of frozen funds.
Last summer, attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights went to court to challenge the licensing requirement, saying it was making it impossible to file a lawsuit challenging the Obama administration program that has targeted al-Awlaki. OFAC quickly granted a license.
"The government should not have been using a program intended to freeze terrorist assets to control whether suspects could be represented by an attorney who was not getting paid," said Jonathan Manes, a national security lawyer at the ACLU.
Thought to be hiding in Yemen, al-Awlaki is believed to have helped inspire the Fort Hood, Texas, shootings, the Times Square bombing attempt and the failed Christmas Day bombing of a jetliner approaching Detroit.
OFAC added al-Awlaki to its terrorism blacklist July 16, freezing any bank accounts in the United States belonging to him and forbidding Americans from doing business with him.
On Dec. 7, the same day that the change in the regulation took effect, U.S. District Judge John Bates threw out the suit aimed at preventing the United States from targeting al-Awlaki for death. Bates said he does not have the authority to review the president's military decisions and that al-Awlaki's father does not have the legal right to sue to stop the United States from killing his son.
