NEW YORK – After decades of litigation, a federal judge is allowing a lawsuit to go forward against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia over the Gulf state’s potential involvement in the 9/11 terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge George B. Daniels marks a significant step forward for the relatives of victims of the Sep. 11, 2001, attacks who have been trying to bring the kingdom to court since 2002. The judge’s ruling out of the Southern District of New York federal court in Manhattan comes after he deemed that lawyers for Saudi Arabia failed to explain a remarkable set of instances where Saudi employees had dealings with the hijackers and also possessed potential attack plans.
One of the Saudi officials in San Diego set up a pair of hijackers with an apartment, recorded a video of high-profile government sites in Washington, DC, and was found to have a drawing with longhand calculations demonstrating how a plane could reach a particular target on the horizon, according to court records.
"A lot of people think, '9/11, that was 24 years ago, hadn’t we gotten to the bottom of that,' and the answer is literally the opposite," said Brett Eagleson, who lost his dad in the attacks. "There still remain all of these loose ends and paths that lead back to Saudi Arabia."
