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Shooting Survivors Suing Empire State Building
Feb 27, 2003 4:39 pm US/Eastern
(NEW YORK) Robberies and bomb threats in the two years before a 1997 fatal shooting rampage atop the Empire State Building have convinced a Manhattan judge to let a lawsuit proceed against the 102-story landmark.
State Supreme Court Justice Edward Lehner said the lawsuit filed by the shooting survivors, who contend that the building's owners and operators provided inadequate security, should be decided by a jury.
Lehner said the defendants "have shown that significant precautions were undertaken by them," but the question for the jury "will be whether the security provisions in effect in the ESB in 1997 were reasonable under the standards then prevailing."
The lawsuit stems from the shooting by Ali Hassan Abu Kamal, a Palestinian school teacher, on the 86th-floor observation deck on Feb. 23, 1997. Kamal, 69, killed one man and wounded five others before shooting himself to death.
Kamal, who entered the United States as a tourist from Gaza, had with him a "document of honor" in which he listed four classes of "arch enemies who should be wiped out and uprooted," police reported after they searched his body.
Police also recovered his a .380 Beretta semi-automatic handgun that he bought after getting an official Florida identification card using the address of his hotel.
The defendants argue that their building has 900 tenants who employ 15,000 people and who have 10,000 visitors a day. They also say the observation deck gets 10,000 visitors each weekday and 25,000 a day on weekends. Despite the large numbers of people entering the building, defendants say, there were just two reported muggings or assaults from 1995 until the shooting.
But the judge noted that 14 gunpoint or knifepoint robberies occurred in the building's commercial stores or on its adjoining sidewalks, and the building received 20 bomb threats during that period.
Lehner also said that after the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, the defendants were aware that the Empire State Building, one of this country's most famous structures, could be the site of a terrorist attack.
Attorney Michael Vogel, who represents shooting victim Jakob Schaad, said the building's operators "were on notice and their internal documents show that they were on notice. After 1993 they wrote to the police and said, 'We could be a target."'
Lehner said the building had a large security staff -- 20 guards stationed around the building, a closed-circuit television system, and one unarmed plainclothes security officer on the observation deck.
At one point, the judge said, security guards began checking bags that were brought into the building but they soon ended that procedure.
Vogel said building operators "were concerned about the image, about tenants complaining that the place was an 'armed camp,' so they stopped the bag searches and they never installed metal detectors. Obviously the security was inadequate.".....
http://1010wins.com/topstories/winstopstories_story_058164227.html
Feb 27, 2003 4:39 pm US/Eastern
(NEW YORK) Robberies and bomb threats in the two years before a 1997 fatal shooting rampage atop the Empire State Building have convinced a Manhattan judge to let a lawsuit proceed against the 102-story landmark.
State Supreme Court Justice Edward Lehner said the lawsuit filed by the shooting survivors, who contend that the building's owners and operators provided inadequate security, should be decided by a jury.
Lehner said the defendants "have shown that significant precautions were undertaken by them," but the question for the jury "will be whether the security provisions in effect in the ESB in 1997 were reasonable under the standards then prevailing."
The lawsuit stems from the shooting by Ali Hassan Abu Kamal, a Palestinian school teacher, on the 86th-floor observation deck on Feb. 23, 1997. Kamal, 69, killed one man and wounded five others before shooting himself to death.
Kamal, who entered the United States as a tourist from Gaza, had with him a "document of honor" in which he listed four classes of "arch enemies who should be wiped out and uprooted," police reported after they searched his body.
Police also recovered his a .380 Beretta semi-automatic handgun that he bought after getting an official Florida identification card using the address of his hotel.
The defendants argue that their building has 900 tenants who employ 15,000 people and who have 10,000 visitors a day. They also say the observation deck gets 10,000 visitors each weekday and 25,000 a day on weekends. Despite the large numbers of people entering the building, defendants say, there were just two reported muggings or assaults from 1995 until the shooting.
But the judge noted that 14 gunpoint or knifepoint robberies occurred in the building's commercial stores or on its adjoining sidewalks, and the building received 20 bomb threats during that period.
Lehner also said that after the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, the defendants were aware that the Empire State Building, one of this country's most famous structures, could be the site of a terrorist attack.
Attorney Michael Vogel, who represents shooting victim Jakob Schaad, said the building's operators "were on notice and their internal documents show that they were on notice. After 1993 they wrote to the police and said, 'We could be a target."'
Lehner said the building had a large security staff -- 20 guards stationed around the building, a closed-circuit television system, and one unarmed plainclothes security officer on the observation deck.
At one point, the judge said, security guards began checking bags that were brought into the building but they soon ended that procedure.
Vogel said building operators "were concerned about the image, about tenants complaining that the place was an 'armed camp,' so they stopped the bag searches and they never installed metal detectors. Obviously the security was inadequate.".....
http://1010wins.com/topstories/winstopstories_story_058164227.html
