Victims Fund Gave $171K to Group Defending Terror Detainees

NATIONAL LEGAL AND POLICY CENTER ^ | 11/8/2001

[piasa]

If this is real, O'Reilly is going to FLIP.

[poweqi]

WTF! This is infurating!I hope the NLPC grinds them to a halt.

[atafak]

I believe that giving aid and comfort to the enemy is classified as treason.

[clintonh8r]

Somebody ping O'Reilly. It's just about time for the villagers to get out the torches and pitchforks.

[Howlin]

I just saw a guy from the Sept 11 Fund on with O'Reilly last night; he told O'Reilly it ALL went, with the exception of 10 percent, to the victims.

[manumission]

November 8, 2001

Mr. Joshua Gotbaum
Executive Director
The September 11th Fund
United Way of New York City
2 Park Avenue
New York, NY  10016

Dear Mr. Gotbaum:

Americans generously donated to the September 11th Fund to help the victims of the terrorist attacks.

They did not contribute to help the terrorists, their supporters, or people arrested or detained because they violated immigration laws.

On October 3, the September 11th Fund announced a $171,000 grant to the Legal Aid Society (LAS).  Your group's own press release stated the purpose of the LAS grant was to "provide emergency civil legal assistance to low-income attack victims."

On November 1, the Wall Street Journal reported in an article ("Detainees on INS Breaches Held in Solitary Status") that the Legal Aid Society was providing civil legal assistance to eight detainees in the Special Housing Unit of the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn.

The article quoted Janet Sabel, identified as the head of the immigration division of New York's Legal Aid Society, as saying that the detainees "are being held in isolation, treated as security risks and interviewed by the FBI with almost no opportunity to first get counsel."

The article further identified the eight detainees as clients of Ms. Sabel and stated that "Unlike people charged criminally, Immigration and Naturalization Services detainees aren't entitled to government-appointed lawyers."

At a time when the public is questioning why so few of the victims have received aid they desperately need from groups that have raised hundreds of millions of dollars, it is disturbing that LAS so quickly rushed to provide free civil legal help to the detainees.

On November 6, Congress held a hearing regarding whether funds donated by the public for September 11th victims could be ethically reprogrammed for other charitable purposes such as blood bank support.

We believe the public will be outraged - and justifiably so - to learn that funds from the September 11th Fund are going to support a group which is apparently  providing civil legal help to those jailed on violations of immigration law in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

If the September 11th Fund is to have any integrity whatsoever to the public and those who have so generously donated to it, it should:

• immediately seek to recover the $171,000 granted to the Legal Aid Society

• publicly seek a full accounting by an independent accounting firm of the resources used by the Legal Aid Society to provide legal assistance to detainees

• require that all funds dispensed in the future go to groups which do not have their own political, ideological, or legal agenda inconsistent with the intent of the donors or inconsistent with the interests of actual or potential terror victims.

Since 1993, the National Legal and Policy Center has monitored abuses by legal services programs through our Legal Services Accountability Project. After exposing and documenting hundreds of instances of waste, fraud, and abuse over the years, this would seem to be the most troubling betrayal of the public trust that we have ever come across.

We ask that you address this situation, as we have specified, without delay.

Sincerely,

Kenneth Boehm, Chairman, and Peter Flaherty, President

[isthisnickcool]

Way to many of the 700,000+ nonprofits in this country are ripping off the American taxpayer. Way to many of them are in business to push their own political ends or to simply enrich their handlers. We need nonprofit corporation reform in America!

[Protect the Bill of Rights]

.. National Legal and Policy Center today blasted the United Way of New York and its September 11 Fund for making a grant of $171,000 to the Legal Aid Society, a group that is apparently providing legal assistance to eight individuals detained as a result of the investigation into the September 11 terrorist attacks.

I thought the Methodist Church would Greg Craig to do the job.

[Norb2569]

Attention all FOX NEWS CHANNELL subscribers... standby for fireworks as soon as the president finishes and O'Reilly does 'The Factor' live!

[Norb2569]

Attention all FOX NEWS CHANNEL subscribers... standby for fireworks as soon as the president finishes and O'Reilly does 'The Factor' live!

[hoot2]

"YOU JUST DON'T GET IT...."

the legal-aid society isn't gonna use the united way $$$ for the terrorist defense......
they're gonna use "$$$" from a different fund.....
when are "you people" gonna learn?
this is just like the "national endowment for the arts"... see? now, isn't that easy?

you just have to know what the "definition" of "IS" is........

[Las Vegas Dave]

One more reason why I NEVER donate to the United Way!

[MissAmericanPie]

If this is true, United Way can say goodbye to all future donations from anyone. They get their donations mainly from getting corporations to brow beat their employees to donating through their pay checks. That needs to stop NOW. Makes you wonder what quid pro quo there is between these corporations and the United Way.

[mjk19]

If the United Way is so eager to help low income victims get legal help why didn't the provide the money to hire a private law firm to handle this job instead of giving it to this commie legal outfit thats defending terrorists. Also, I am sure there a tons of lawyers in NYC who would do this job pro-bono. I learned a long time ago, thanks to information provided on Free Republic, never to trust the United Aid. The United Way has been funneling money to left wing groups for as long as I can remember. BOYCOTT UNITED WAY!!!

[schmelvin]

If they had given the money to the real victims like they were supposed to, then the victims could have used it to take care of their most pressing needs, including legal fees.

[LarryLied]

I just saw a guy from the Sept 11 Fund on with O'Reilly last night; he told O'Reilly it ALL went, with the exception of 10 percent, to the victims.

In liberal-think, perpetrators and suspects are victims, donja know?

[Ann Archy]

United Way is HORRIBLE!!! I wouldn't give one red cent to those Commie Pinkos....but even I CAN"T BELIEVE THIS!!!

[LarryLied]

Did you hear O'Reilly will comment on this tonight?

[Ann Archy]

Wonder if that 20th hijacker Zachariah...something...will be helped by the United Way....hope so....another NAIL in their coffin.