US Court orders Iran to pay ex-FBI agent US41.4 billion

Agencies

A US court has ordered Iran to pay the family of a former FBI agent US$1.5 billion in a case accusing Iran of kidnapping the agent who was on an unauthorized CIA mission to an Iranian Island in 2007.

Robert Levinson’s family and the US government believes that he died in the captivity of the Iranian government.

Iran, however, denies the accusation, even though officials there have at times offered contradictory accounts of what happened to him on Kish Island.

In a ruling dated Thursday, the US District Court in Washington found Iran owed Levinson''s family USD 1.35 billion in punitive damages and USD 107 million in compensatory damages for his kidnapping.

The court cited the case of Otto Warmbier, an American college student who died in 2017 shortly after being freed from captivity in North Korea, in deciding to award the massive amount of punitive damages to Levinson''s family, reported AP.

“Iran''s conduct here is also unique, given that — astonishingly — it plucked a former FBI and DEA special agent from the face of the earth without warning, tortured him, held him captive for as long as 13 years, and to this day refuses to admit its responsibility,” the ruling by Judge Timothy J. Kelly said.

Levinson's family had received a USD 2.5 million annuity from the CIA to stop a lawsuit revealing details of his work, while the agency forced out three veteran analysts and disciplined seven others.