Blackwater Pushes Back: BW is not "suing the families"

Blackwater has long taken it on the chin when attacked in the blogosphere and media, but this seems to be changing.  Within the past week, Blackwater has twice issued press releases correcting the record.  The company that is renowned for its aggressive and effective defense of VIPs in its care is finally defending itself.

Today, Blackwater challenged one of the more damning charges against it, clarifying that it is not suing the families of the four Blackwater contractors who were slain in Fallujah, as the families' lawyers have claimed in a recent press release which has made its way through the blogosphere.  Blackwater writes:   

Blackwater is seeking in arbitration to enforce its contracts with the four deceased men. The respondent in that arbitration is a North Carolina lawyer who represents the "ancillary estates" of the four deceased men. Those estates were established by the North Carolina lawyer for only one purpose: to sue Blackwater.

The so-called family defense fund announced recently was not set up for the families," said Blackwater President Gary Jackson, "but was set up by and for the trial lawyers."

Blackwater adds, it "seeks nothing from the families."

Last week the Daily Mail, a British tabloid published a picture of a Blackwater Aviation CASA-212 landing at a RAF base and claimed it was proof that "'torture flights' are STILL landing in the UK."   Behind the scenes, Blackwater challenged the tabloid and won.  The story was withdrawn from the Daily Mail's website, although the paper never published an official retraction.  A British tabloid backing off a story is rare, but the bigger story is the point by point refutation by Blackwater in its press release--it's unprecedented. 

In case there's any doubt why they're now speaking up, "Blackwater hopes the debunking of this latest conspiracy theory will encourage the media to report on the true nature of our work, providing training for military members and law enforcement and protecting U.S. government civilians overseas."

Blackwater's corporate culture is an outgrowth of Navy SEAL culture and this has clearly contributed to the company's dedication to excellence that has made it an industry leader.  Some of these values, however, have not always worked in Blackwater's favor, namely the belief that discretion is the better part of valor.  While this might be prized or even required by its government contractors, it's hurt them in the media.   Instead of being perceived as noble as it is within their own culture, Blackwater's silence has been construed as evidence of secretiveness and has helped fuel conspiracy theories.  Until now, even the most outrageous charges have gone unchallenged. 

Honorable, but hardly Web 2.0. 

The changing media policy was first evidenced here on The Spy Who Billed Me when Blackwater president Gary Jackson broke the company's longstanding silence with an interview that was later picked up by the New York Times' Week in Review.  The next month when Blackwater critic Jeremy Scahill visited Blackwater founder Erik Prince's home town of Holland, Michigan, Prince published a short essay in a Grand Rapids newspaper, responding to some of Scahill's charges. 

Slowly and cautiously, they're coming out of the closet.

After reading last week's press release, I asked Blackwater spokesperson Anne Tyler about the challenges of balancing the sensitivity of their contractors, with their growing need to set the record straight, particularly as they have faced opposition as they have sought to expand training facilities.  Here's what she said:

Blackwater has long been the victim of a smear campaign waged against us by people with little regard for the truth but an indefatigable drive stemming from personal agendas.  Blackwater has never been secretive. It has been appropriately cautious and complied with the direction we receive from our government customers. We are proud of what we do and remain 100% committed to doing what we do best -- training military and law enforcement professionals and protecting U.S. government civilians overseas."

 

This response makes it clear that its silence has been in part because of the needs of its US government contractors and since single client--in this case the USG-- makes up the lion's share of business, it makes sense that they would carefully test the blackwaters of the media as their strategy develops.   

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Comments

[BillW.]

"Blackwater is seeking in arbitration to enforce its contracts with the four deceased men."

What exactly does that mean?

[Frank]

Blackwater is empowered by the US government to act, on its behalf,on matters that would otherwise impeach its credibility.As an outside agency they can act,as required by their employer,without regard to due process as stipulated by Geneva conventions.

[R J Hillhouse]

BillW,

I have not reviewed the actual suit. My admittedly limited understanding is that they are trying to enforce a liability waiver in the contracts that precludes legal action against BW in the event of injury or death.

Attorneys who read this can correct me, but it appears to me that the big advantage to enforcing an arbitration clause in this case would be that no binding precedents could be established by a court. A court ruling that would find PMCs potentially liable for injury and death in war zones would be devastating for the industry.

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Excellent point, Frank. While I do not know specifically about BW, there is strong indication that private companies are used as legal workarounds to restrictions upon the USG, perhaps including constitutional ones. Such a use of private corporations is not unprecedented and it raises a host of questions. Given that we are at war and these companies are an integral part of that effort--for good or bad--I seriously doubt that litigation in these directions is ever allowed to go to far.

I've touched on this topic a couple of other times, you might want to glance at the posts:

Has the CIA Outsourced the Black Sites?

and

Outsourced Dirty Work and Legal Liability