By Dan Christensen New York World Trade Center\u2019s North Tower ablaze on Sept. 11, 2001<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In a ruling that could lead to the release of significant new information about 9\/11, including details about who funded the al Qaeda terrorist attacks, a Miami federal judge has rejected FBI assertions that many records should be kept secret due to privacy considerations.<\/p>\n At the same time, U.S. District Court Judge Cecilia Altonaga granted summary judgment in the FBI\u2019s favor regarding more than 1,000 pages of classified records it withheld from public view citing national security and other exemptions to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Those records, about which little is known, will remain secret.<\/p>\n A trial could be needed to resolve outstanding issues in the case, the judge said.<\/p>\n Florida Bulldog\u2019s<\/em> parent, Broward Bulldog Inc., sued the FBI last June seeking records of the 9\/11 Review Commission kept by the FBI. The commission, whose most prominent member was Reagan-era Attorney General Ed Meese, was authorized by Congress to take an \u201cexternal\u201d look at the FBI\u2019s post-9\/11 performance and to evaluate new evidence. Instead, Meese and two other members were chosen, paid and spoon-fed information by the FBI.<\/p>\n Among other things, Judge Altonaga analyzed the legality of FBI redactions in 28 partially declassified documents that were disputed by the Bulldog\u2019<\/em>s attorneys. Again and again, she declared as \u201cunconvincing\u201d FBI arguments asserting a need to veil the names of agents, suspects and others for privacy reasons \u2013 specifically citing FOIA Exemptions 6 and 7(c).<\/p>\n \u201cRelease of this information could further the public interest in learning about the September 11 attacks and may outweigh any privacy interest individuals mentioned in the document may have,\u201d she wrote. You can read her order here.<\/a><\/p>\n Miami attorney Thomas Julin represents Florida Bulldog<\/em>. \u201cThe FBI must stop being so secretive about the events of 9\/11,\u201d he said. \u201cExcessive assertion of privacy is harming national security. The next FBI director should put a stop to this.\u201d<\/p>\n Here\u2019s what the judge had to say about numerous privacy deletions made to an Oct. 5, 2012 FBI memo about an active but previously unknown investigation by New York authorities, who were actively looking to indict an unidentified suspect with providing material support for the 9\/11 hijackers:<\/p>\n \u201cPlaintiffs have identified the significant public interest in information about who may have been involved in the September 11 attacks\u2026Given the significant public interest in learning about possible suspects involved in the attacks, the FBI has not met its burden of showing Exemptions 6 and 7(c) apply to the selectively redacted names.\u201d<\/p>\n The October 2012 document was also censored for national security and other reasons. Those redactions were upheld by Altonaga and will not be made public. Also not to be released: draft copies of the 9\/11 Review Commission\u2019s final report, which was released in March 2015.<\/p>\n The title page of the 9\/11 Review Commission\u2019s 2015 report.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Other partially-declassified FBI documents similarly appear to be chock full of deleted information about September 11th<\/sup> that Judge Altonaga determined is being improperly withheld from the public.<\/p>\n Among the most compelling is a PowerPoint presentation given to the 9\/11 Review Commission on April 25, 2014 in a closed meeting. The title of the PowerPoint was \u201cOverview of 9\/11 Investigation,\u201d and court papers say it \u201ccovers the hijackers, where they attended flight school, how they adapted to Western life and blended in, and known co-conspirators.\u201d<\/p>\n The PowerPoint pages that Judge Altonaga now has identified as being improperly blanked out include these topics:<\/p>\n Questions about who bankrolled the 9\/11 attacks are at the heart of massive litigation in New York against principal defendants, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Saudi High Commission for Relief of Bosnia & Herzegovina. The consolidated lawsuits were brought by relatives of the nearly 3,000 people who died in the attacks, survivors and businesses that suffered property damage.<\/p>\n Before he was crowned in 2015, King Salman \u201cactively directed\u201d the Saudi High Commission, an official charity whose funding was \u201cespecially important to al Qaeda acquiring the strike capabilities used to launch attacks in the U.S.,\u201d according to court papers filed last year by lawyers for the 9\/11victims and their families.<\/p>\n The Freedom of Information Act requires the FBI to conduct an adequate search for records that is \u201creasonably calculated to uncover all relevant (requested) documents.\u201d Florida Bulldog<\/em> attorney Julin argued, however, that the FBI\u2019s search of 9\/11 Review Commission records was inadequate and had intentionally concealed records that appear to remain missing. But Altonaga decided the government had met its burden of showing the search was \u201cadequate and reasonable.\u201d<\/p>\n
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<\/a><\/p>\n\u2018Significant public interest\u2019<\/h3>\n
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A future king\u2019s involvement<\/h3>\n