Extraordinary Conflict of Interest: Bush Cousin Presides Over Federal Court Case Against Former Bush Administration Officials

NEW YORK, April 7, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Confounding lawyers and legal scholars all over the world, Judge John Walker, first cousin of former President George W. Bush, was one of three judges of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals to hear argument Tuesday in Gallop v. Cheney, Rumsfeld and Myers.

The lawsuit was brought by a soldier injured during the attack on the Pentagon and accuses former Vice President Dick Cheney, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Richard Myers, of conspiring to facilitate the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

The attacks killed 3000 Americans, plus many who have died from the toxic clean-up conditions at Ground Zero.

Attorney William Veale, acting for April Gallop, learned of the assignment the usual 5 days before the argument, and filed a motion to disqualify Judge Walker.

There was no prior decision regarding the motion, and when Veale asked about it in court the motion was denied by Judge Winter.  Veale then requested a continuance to seek appellate review of the court's ruling but that was denied as well.

Argument followed but Walker, and fellow judges Cabranes and Winter diverted attention to whether Veale, former Chief Assistant Public Defender, and lecturer in Criminal Trial Practice at the University of California, Boalt Hall, was properly licensed to practice before the court.

The Tuesday appeal followed a ruling by then District Court Judge Denny Chin, dismissing Ms. Gallop's lawsuit with prejudice, writing that the allegations are "implausible" and the product of "cynical delusion and fantasy."

The judges were apparently unaware of growing world doubts about the official story of 9/11, including a recent poll by Germany's prestigious Emnid Institute, reporting 89.5% of Germans in doubt.

Gallop's appeal brief stated that Judge Chin's summary misrepresented important allegations in the case, and failed to consider virtually half of the factual assertions contained in the Complaint.  Chin also failed to mention the words, actions, and locations of the three defendants at the time of the crime.

Veale, amidst frequent interruptions from the three judges, managed to point out Cheney's direct involvement in tracking and dealing with the airplane that was heading for the Pentagon, as reported to the 9/11 Commission by then Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta, a winner of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Judge Cabranes gave no sign of being familiar with the allegations in the Complaint concerning conflicts about the flight path of AA 77 (which allegedly hit the Pentagon) between the National Transportation Safety Board and the 9/11 Commission.

Nor did he show any sign of being aware of the scrubbing of the radar tracks in the area at the time of the attacks, nor of the counter-intuitive strategy of the suicidal hijacker who chose not to kill 20,000 occupants of the Pentagon, including Secretary Rumsfeld, by flying into the roof of the Pentagon.  

Instead this novice pilot allegedly executed a spiraling descent, beyond the capacity of the plane and certainly the capability of the pilot, to accomplish an incredible horizontal ground level entry into a sparsely occupied and recently reinforced section of the building, causing 125 deaths.

Veale asked what offense to justice could come from allowing the case to go forward, when the possibility of sanctions awaits purveyors of frivolous accusations.  Gallop's lawyer's final lament acknowledged the existence of evil in the world, its attraction to power and its disregard for citizenship, but Walker interrupted that sentence before it could be completed as well.

Media contact:  William Veale,  [email protected], [email protected],  510-845-5675, 925-212-3678

SOURCE Center for 9/11 Justice