Imams' legal action against US Airways, police and FBI given go ahead

A shield law for those who report suspected terrorist activities does not apply to law enforcement, a judge ruled Friday in a discrimination lawsuit filed by six imams who were removed from a US Airways flight in 2006.

U.S. District Judge Ann Montgomery said it was apparently the first time a court has had to decide whether a 2007 law that provides legal immunity for individuals who report suspected terrorist activities in good faith specifically protects law enforcement officers.

Congress passed the law in response to the imams' lawsuit. The Islamic religious leaders were removed from the flight in Minneapolis in November 2006 after passengers reported what they considered suspicious behavior.

The imams, who were handcuffed and questioned, sued the Tempe, Ariz.-based airline, several airport police officers and an FBI agent on several grounds, including discrimination and false arrest. Passengers who had complained about the imams' behavior were dropped from the lawsuit after Congress passed the shield law.

The FBI agent argued that he also was protected under that law because he believed he had taken "reasonable action in good faith" in response to the report of suspicious activity.

But Montgomery concluded that Congress put nothing in the law to change the "traditional qualified immunity principles" that apply to law enforcement officers. And while airport police had disputed that the imams were ever arrested, Montgomery concluded they were.

"The right not to be arrested in the absence of probable cause is clearly established and ... no reasonable officer could have believed that the arrest of plaintiffs was proper," the judge wrote.

Associated Press, 24 July 2009

See also CAIR press release, 24 July 2009