US appeals court overturns 1983 Beirut bombing victims' $1.68B judgment against Iran
A US appeals court has revoked a $1.68 billion judgment against Central Bank of Iran (CBI), known as Bank Markazi, regarding the damages won by the families of the victims of a 1983 bombing in Beirut, which targeted a US Marine Corps barracks in the Lebanese capital and was blamed on the Islamic Republic.
The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan threw out the $1.68 billion judgment on Wednesday and said a lower court judge should have addressed questions of state law before ruling against Bank Markazi and Clearstream, a subsidiary of Germany’s stock exchange operator Deutsche Boerse where Iranian assets are held.
In a 3-0 decision, the panel also rejected a claim that a 2019 federal law designed to make it easier to confiscate Iranian assets outside the United States waived Bank Markazi's sovereign immunity.
That law "neither abrogates Bank Markazi's jurisdictional immunity nor provides an independent grant of subject matter jurisdiction," Circuit Judge Robert Sack wrote.
The court returned the case to US District Loretta Preska in Manhattan to address state law questions in the 11-year-old case, and decide whether the case can proceed in Bank Markazi's absence.
Bombing victims sought to hold Iran liable for what they claimed to be providing material support for the October 23, 1983, suicide attack that killed 241 US service members, by seizing bond proceeds held by Clearstream in a blocked account on the CBI's behalf.
The CBI declared immunity under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, which generally shields foreign governments from liability in US courts.
The plaintiffs sued in 2013 to partially satisfy a $2.65 billion default judgment they had won against Iran in 2007. Another judge dismissed the case in 2015, but the 2nd Circuit Court revived it in 2017.
Then in 2020, the US Supreme Court ordered a fresh review in light of the 2019 law, which then-President Donald Trump signed as part of the National Defense Authorization Act.
The plaintiffs have said they hold more than $4 billion of judgments against Iran and have been unable to collect for decades.
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