Boeing Subsidiary Tied to Torture-by-Proxy Scheme

By Scott Horton

The American Civil Liberties Union has announced that it is commencing a suit against Jeppesen Dataplan Inc., a subsidiary of Boeing, on the grounds that it provided “substantial support” to the Central Intelligence Agency’s illegal torture-by-proxy scheme. The ACLU suit links the company to three separate episodes in which individuals were “disappeared,” tortured and mistreated. The lawsuit is reported in today’s Los Angeles Times. Jeppesen Dataplan had previously been described by The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer as the “CIA’s travel agent.” In her report, Mayer said that the company managed logistical arrangements associated with the CIA’s extraordinary renditions program. More than two dozen CIA agents and contractors now stand under criminal indictment in connection with implementation of the program, and criminal authorities in Germany, Italy, and Spain are now studying the operations of Jeppesen Dataplan as they relate to the overall criminal enterprise.