Lawsuit Filed Against Hillary Clinton

Yesterday, a civil action was filed in the D.C. federal district court by Larry Klayman, of Freedom Watch, against Democratic Party presidential nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Mr. Klayman represents: Pat Smith, mother of Sean Smith, an American U.S. Foreign Service member and Information Programs Officer, U.S. Consulate General, U.S. Department of State who was killed during the September 11, 2012 Benghazi Attack; and Charles Woods, father of Tyrone Woods, a Navy SEAL also killed during the Benghazi Attack.

The complaint begins:

Plaintiffs Patricia (hereafter “Pat Smith”) Smith and Charles Woods are the parents of Sean Smith and Tyrone Woods, respectively, each of whom were killed by Islamic terrorists during the attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012. Hillary Rodham Clinton (“Defendant Clinton”), who was the U.S. Secretary of State at the time, has since been found to have used a private e-mail server to send and receive confidential and classified government information, often concerning matters of national security, during her tenure. In fact, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), James Comey, publicly stated that Defendant Clinton, at a minimum, was “extremely careless” in handling confidential and classified government information and “there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information.”

It is highly probable, given Defendant Clinton’s history of reckless handling of classified information, that Defendant Clinton, as Secretary of State, sent and received information about Ambassador Christopher Stevens and thus the U.S. Department of State activities and covert operations that the deceased were a part of in Benghazi, Libya. This information was compromised from the second that it left Defendant Clinton’s private e-mail server and easily found its way to foreign powers including, but not limited to Russia, Iran, China, and North Korea. As a direct result of Defendant Clinton’s reckless handling of this classified, sensitive information, Islamic terrorists were able to obtain the whereabouts of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and thus the U.S. State Department and covert and other government operations in Benghazi, Libya and subsequently orchestrate, plan, and execute the now infamous September 11, 2012 attack.

From the illegal use of Defendant Clinton’s private email server, it was reasonably foreseeable that Islamic terrorists would premeditatedly kill Plaintiffs’ sons. Immediately after the attack, Defendant Clinton, in an effort to save the re-election chances of President Barack Obama, and in turn, her own chances at the 2016 Presidency, lied to Plaintiffs and the public at large that the Benghazi Attacks were caused by Islamic reaction over an anti-Muslim YouTube video that had been posted on the internet. These lies were perpetrated despite the fact that she knew immediately that this video was actually not the cause of the attack—information that she shared with the Prime Minister of Egypt and her own daughter, Chelsea Clinton, but hid from Plaintiffs and the public at large. Defendant Clinton even promised Plaintiffs that the person responsible for the video would be arrested. Plaintiff Woods recorded the conversation with Defendant Clinton contemporaneously in his diary, which he has recorded in for many years. Now, Defendant Clinton, in an attempt to save her reputation and intimidate Plaintiffs and their surviving family members into silence as she attempts to be elected President in the November, 2016 election, has gone on a defamatory smear campaign to paint Plaintiffs as liars in the public eye in order to discredit Plaintiffs, who have been vocal about Defendant Clinton’s pattern and practice of dishonesty regarding what caused the Benghazi attack, its aftermath, and the death of their sons.

The complaint goes on assert claims of wrongful death, negligence, infliction of emotional distress, defamation and false light. To the extent that the complaint speaks to acts the Secretary Clinton took while in office, those should be dismissed under the Westfall Act, 28 USC 2769. Under that provision, a federal official or former federal official has the right to have the United States substitute for her as the defendant (after which the claim against the United States would be dismissed on sovereign immunity grounds). The U.S. Attorney or Attorney General would trigger such a substitution by submitting a certification that Secretary Clinton was acting within the scope of her employment in regard to the claimed acts. If the plaintiffs contest that scope certification, the judge then reviews the scope of employment issue and can hold a limited hearing if necessary.

Plaintiffs will likely argue that at least some of the claimed acts took place after Secretary Clinton left office. It will be interesting to see that play out. As the readers will recall, the counsel to this case, Mr. Klayman, was a fairly constant irritant to the Clinton administration when he leveraged an earlier civil action to depose many on the White House staff.