My Silence Cannot Be Bought
by Beverly Eckert
I've chosen to go to court rather than accept a payoff from the 9/11 victims compensation fund. Instead, I want to know what went so wrong with our intelligence and security systems that a band of religious fanatics was able to turn four U.S passenger jets into an enemy force, attack our cities and kill 3,000 civilians with terrifying ease. I want to know why two 110-story skyscrapers collapsed in less than two hours and why escape and rescue options were so limited.
I am suing because unlike other investigative avenues, including congressional hearings and the 9/11 commission, my lawsuit requires all testimony be given under oath and fully uses powers to compel evidence.
The victims fund was not created in a spirit of compassion. Rather, it was a tacit acknowledgement by Congress that it tampered with our civil justice system in an unprecedented way. Lawmakers capped the liability of the airlines at the behest of lobbyists who descended on Washington while the Sept. 11 fires still smoldered.
And this liability cap protects not just the airlines, but also World Trade Center builders, safety engineers and other defendants.
The caps on liability have consequences for those who want to sue to shed light on the mistakes of 9/11. It means the playing field is tilted steeply in favor of those who need to be held accountable. With the financial consequences other than insurance proceeds removed, there is no incentive for those whose negligence contributed to the death toll to acknowledge their failings or implement reforms. They can afford to deny culpability and play a waiting game.
By suing, I've forfeited the "$1.8 million average award" for a death claim I could have collected under the fund. Nor do I have any illusions about winning money in my suit. What I do know is I owe it to my husband, whose death I believe could have been avoided, to see that all of those responsible are held accountable. If we don't get answers to what went wrong, there will be a next time. And instead of 3,000 dead, it will be 10,000. What will Congress do then?
So I say to Congress, big business and everyone who conspired to divert attention from government and private-sector failures: My husband's life was priceless, and I will not let his death be meaningless. My silence cannot be bought.
Beverly Eckert, whose husband died at the World Trade Center, is the founder of Voices of September 11th, a victims advocacy group.
CD Editors Note: Beverly Eckert was killed on February 12, 2009 in the crash of Continental flight 3407 outside of Buffalo, New York.
Beverly Eckert had been at the White House just last week, as part of a meeting that President Barack Obama had with the relatives of victims of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Eckert, who had lost her husband on 9/11, had become a leading activist for the victims' families.
Beverly Eckert.jpg
Last night, Eckert was among the victims of the fiery crash of Continental Flight 3407 outside of Buffalo, N.Y.
""She was such an important part of all of our work," said Mary Fetchet, another 9/11 family activist.
"This past week,'' Obama said at his Monday evening news conference at the White House, "I met with families of those who were lost in 9/11 -- a reminder of the costs of allowing those safe havens to exist. My bottom line is that we cannot allow al Qaeda to operate. We cannot have those safe havens in that region. And we're going to have to work both smartly and effectively, but with consistency, in order to make sure that those safe havens don't exist.''
Eckert had been among the most visible faces of the families in the aftermath of the airliner attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, where her husband, Sean Rooney, her high school sweetheart, died. They had been on the telephone when she heard an explosion and then nothing more.
She had tearfully called on Congress to do a better job protecting Americans from terrorism, part of a crew of Sept. 11 widows, mothers, and children who became amateur lobbyists, spending months in Congress and ultimately forcing lawmakers in 2004 to pass sweeping reforms of U.S. intelligence. As co-chair of the 9/11 Family Steering Committee, she pressed for the 9/11 Comission that investigated the attacks and prompted the ultimate reforms.
All Eckert wanted, she had said, was to go home and live a normal life.
"I did all of this for Sean's memory, I did it for him," she had said. "There is a euphoria in knowing that we reached the top of the hill. ... I just wanted Sean to come home from work. Maybe now, someone else's Sean will get to come home."
Eckert was returning to her own hometown last night, when the plane crashed, on her way to celebrate her late husband's 58th birthday with family.
Wire services contributed to this report, and the 2002 file photo of Beverly Eckert, a Continental flight crash victim, holding a picture of her husband, Sean Rooney, a 9/11 victim, is by Douglas Healey, AP files)
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