It was all very heart-warming. Attorney General Jeff Sessions showed up at Arlington National Cemetery yesterday for a memorial service to address the victims’ families of ill-fated Pan Am Flight 103. His remarks were emotional and touching. But there is one critical remaining issue with Pan Am Flight 103 that still hasn’t been resolved.
Sessions knows this, and surely, he can do something about it. So, what is it and why doesn’t he?
As Liberty Nation has chronicled there remains the outstanding case of the Abbott Group. These are elderly pilots – most of whom served their country in the military – and are seeking a settlement from the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission (FCSC). They claim – and Pan Am Executives back them up – that Flight 103 was the principal cause of Pan Am’s bankruptcy in 1991. When Pan Am went under these tenured pilots were left with nothing – no retirement, no health insurance, zip, nada. The government has a mandatory age retirement for pilots and as such these people were unable to secure a new employer.
Now there are those that say the pilots have no right to any reparations – that Pan Am went the way of the dinosaur for a thousand reasons. However, three former Pan Am executives testified in front of the FCSC that Flight 103 and the subsequent publicity from it was the death knell for the air carrier.
So, the Abbott Group made their case in front of the FCSC last December 14th with eight hours of testimony in front of a packed house seeking a settlement from the $1.5B the U.S. received from Libya. But still, there is no decision from the two Obama appointees who make up this unelected body that has final say on the issue. Now one may argue that the pilots have no right to the money. But they cannot argue that no decision is a fair treatment of the Abbott Group.
In remarks made at the memorial service yesterday Session said, “The first and most important job of any government is to protect the safety and the rights of its citizens.” Really? Does he mean this? If so, Sessions needs to get off his duff and place a call to the FCSC. Because as of this writing the rights of these elderly Pan Am pilots are being trampled upon by a commission that can’t seem to make up their mind.
It’s time – long past time – that all the dominos that fell as a result of Pan Am Flight 103 are righted. And that cannot happen until the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission issues a decision on the Abbott Group.
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