WASHINGTON, Dec. 14 (UPI) -- The U.S. Supreme Court Monday refused to hear a case in which four Britons, who have since been released from Guantanamo, wanted to sue U.S. officials.
The rejection leaves intact a Washington appeals court ruling that said former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and 10 military officers are not liable under the law for the claims of torture and religious bias raised by the freed detainees, SCOTUSBLOG.com reported.
The Obama administration had asked the court to reject the cases. The administration said regardless of the claims the four were making now, they had no legal basis for those claims when they were in the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from January 2002 to March 2004, the report said.
The Supreme Court ruled earlier Guantanamo prisoners had no constitutional rights, SCOTUSBLOG said. In ruling in favor of official immunity, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit was following orders from the high court to reverse an earlier decision rejecting immunity.
