Silverstein v airlines

In 2004 Larry Silverstein, who owned Building 7 and had signed a 99 year lease on the Twin Towers just six weeks before 9/11, sued American Airlines, United Airlines, and companies providing security at the airports (the “airline defendants”).  Silverstein claimed that the airline defendants had been negligent in allowing the hijackers to board and hijack the planes and fly them into the Twin Towers.  He claimed that the plane crashes and fires “proximately caused the total destruction” of the Twin Towers, Building 7 and the other buildings in the World Trade Center. ( Complaint in 08cv03722 April 2008 Document 1 Filed 04/17/08, page 2)

No mention has been made of the fact that it would have been impossible for those plane crashes and fires to have destroyed the buildings or the abundant evidence of controlled demolition.  The defense attorneys could make an affirmative defense of this argument and exculpatory evidence.

On November 28, 2012 9/11 Truth activist Mark Graham wrote to the insurance companies for the airlines to inform them of exculpatory evidence that the defense could use in these lawsuits and to offer to put them in touch with building experts who could provide expert testimony.

Graham sent his letter via certified mail to 12 insurance companies and attorneys for the airline defendants including some of the biggest:  Lloyd’s of America, Travelers Cos, Swiss Re, Zurich American, Global Aerospace and U.S. Aircraft Insurance Group.

The letter framed the issue like this:

There is exculpatory scientific evidence, including expert testimony, proving two separate claims.  Potential settlements should take these claims and supporting evidence into account.  The defense attorneys should make an affirmative defense based on these claims and this evidence.  The claims are:

#1)  That it was impossible for the impact of the hijacked airplanes and the resulting fires to destroy the Twin Towers and / or Building 7 of the World Trade Center.  This would have been against the laws of physics.  It could not have occurred and did not occur.

#2)  That the cause of the building collapses was the detonation of explosive demolition charges in a timed sequence placed in the buildings that destroyed the steel columns supporting the buildings.  This is known as “controlled demolition” and it is an organized, systematic process for deliberately for taking down steel framed skyscrapers.

It follows that even assuming, for the sake of argument, that the airline defendants were negligent in allowing the hijackers to board and hijack Flight 11 and Flight 175 and fly them into the Twin Towers starting fires in the Twin Towers those plane impacts and fires did not cause or even contribute to the total destruction of the Twin Towers.

From the point of view of United Airlines and American Airlines this means that, at most, the airline companies should only be held legally and financially liable for the damage to the floors at which their planes hit the Twin Towers and the floors above and possibly a few floors below but in any case not the entire Tower.  Legal and financial liability for the damage to the floors below should be properly assigned to those who planned and carried out the controlled demolitions.  Graham wrote, “I do not know who those individuals are.  They are as yet publicly unidentified terrorists.”

Specifically the evidence of controlled demolition of the Twin Towers and Building 7 includes:

•           Sounds of explosions and even flashes of light at the Twin Towers, before the buildings’  destruction
•           Rapid onset of collapse
•           Symmetry of the collapses despite asymmetrical damage
•           Collapse through the path of what was greatest resistance
•           Free-fall gravitational acceleration for over 100 feet in Building 7, admitted by NIST *
•           Multi-ton steel sections ejected laterally from the Twin Towers
•           Almost complete shattering of the structural steel frame
•           90,000 tons of concrete pulverized into dust – in mid air
•           Stacks of 110 floors missing at each of the Twin Towers
•           Isolated explosive ejections 20–40 stories below the zone of destruction in the Towers
•           Massive, pyroclastic like expanding clouds of dust covering all of lower Manhattan
•           Molten steel/iron found in all 3 debris piles
•           Ubiquitous iron spheres found in the dust documented by USGS scientists
•           Evidence of thermite incendiaries in WTC dust
•           Office fires and jet fuel cannot produce temperatures capable of melting steel or iron
•           Foreknowledge of collapse by the media, NYPD and FDNY

The cases, known as In re September 11 Litigation, 21 MC 101 (AKH) are:

WorldTradeCenter Properties LLC. et al v. American Airlines, Inc. et al 08cv03722-AKH

WorldTradeCenter Properties LLC. et al v. United Airlines, Inc. et al08cv03719-AKH

The cases are in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (SDNY).

Judge Alvin K Hellerstein is a firm believer in the official conspiracy theory of 9/11.

Judge Hellerstein wrote in the “Statement of Undisputed Facts” (sic) of an opinion in the September 11 litigation, “The 9/11 Commission investigated and reported the relevant facts of the September 11, 2001 terrorists’ hijackings and the events following those hijackings.  The parties have accepted the reported version as it relates to the facts of this case, and I do as well.”

OPINION AND ORDER GRANTING SUMMARY JUDGMENT DISMISSING WORLD TRADE CENTER PROPERTIES, LLC TOWER-TWO CLAIMS AGAINST AMERICAN AND GLOBE, January 16, 2009, page 3

Judge Hellerstein elaborated on his belief that the 9/11 Commission had done an adequate job and its final report was accurate in a July 16, 2009 opinion and order, saying  “I hold that relevant and appropriate findings made by the Commission are potentially trustworthy and admissible. The Commission’s goal was to provide the government and the public with the ‘facts and circumstances surrounding the attacks.’  IAA § 603(a). The Commission heard 160 witnesses, was free from bias, and conducted public hearings that were the adequate equivalent of cross-examination in protecting litigants’ rights.”

Opinion and order resolving discovery and evidentiary motions July 16 2009, page 28)  This opinion and order is full of other statements by the judge stating he believes the 9/11 Commission.