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Global Relief Files Lawsuit Over Frozen Assets
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Powell and FBI chief Robert Mueller are all named in the suit. |
BRIDGEVIEW, Illinois, Jan. 31 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A U.S.-based Muslim charity has filed suit against the U.S. government, seeking to overturn an order freezing its assets and records.
Global Relief Foundation (GRF) charged the Treasury Department with illegally freezing its assets, smearing its reputation and effectively putting it out of business in a civil suit filed Monday in U.S. district court.
FBI and Treasury agents raided the charity's Bridgeview offices in December 2001, carting off everything from computers to furniture, in one of a number of raids on Muslim charitable organizations.
The groups, including the top U.S. Islamic charity, the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, were targeted in the wake of the September 11 attacks, as U.S. officials sought to crackdown on groups it suspected of funneling money to terrorist groups.
But in the civil suit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, lawyers for GRF, which raised five million dollars for Muslim charitable causes in 2000, insisted that the U.S. government had never furnished any evidence to back up its suspicions.
"GRF is a lawful American company," said attorney Roger Simmons in a statement.
"The U.S. government has made no charges against GRF and has not given it a day in court to prove its innocence.
"The blocking of GRF's assets, seizure of its documents, and subsequent public statements by representatives of the federal government accusing GRF of ties to terrorism have violated the constitutional rights of this U.S. corporate citizen. We seek due process and a legitimate means of redressing of GRF's grievances."
The lawsuit seeks to overturn the Treasury Department’s blocking notice issued December 14, 2001, that froze all assets and records held by GRF.
One of GRF’s arguments is that although the federal government took these actions purportedly invoking laws designed to seize assets of foreign organizations, GRF is a U.S.-based corporation.
One of the allegations in the lawsuit states that the federal government is unlawfully prohibiting the creation of a legal defense fund to allow U.S. citizens to voluntarily contribute to legal and media efforts to defend GRF.
U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, Secretary of State Colin Powell and Federal Bureau of Investigation chief Robert Mueller are all named in the suit.
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