Ravi is an immature, upper middle class kid and a “casual homophobe” (more on  that term later) but he is not a perpetrator of a hate crime.  To consider him more than marginally complicit in the death of Tyler Clementi hurts two groups: victims of true hate crimes and the mental health community.

First off, I reject the mostly Right Wing assertion that we should banish the term “hate crime” from our legal system.  ”Aren’t all crimes hate crimes” they argue?  Such arguments are specious an predicated on the belief that political correctedness is the only reason such a label exists.  Bullshit.  When a man has a chain put around his ankles and is dragged behind a car because he is black, that’s a hate crime.  When a Sikh man is shot for being a “Muslim terrorist“, that’s a hate crime.  When a gay man is tied to a fence and tortured, that’s a hate crime.  Being stupid while you are coming of age and meeting people with different backgrounds than you?  Not a hate crime.  Most crimes are committed because of anger, greed, jealousy, or mental illness.  A hate crime is different.  It is often very violent and there is rarely a personal gain.  The crime is committed as an act of domination or intimidation, often based on unjustified fear.  Nothing about Dharun Ravi’s behavior, as evinced by texts, emails, tweets, and witnesses shows even an inkling of such a motive.  One could argue he was more uncomfortable with Clementi’s socio-economic status than his sexuality!  He was also uncomfortable about an older man, a stranger, coming into his room and having sex.  Many of us may have reacted poorly in such an instance.  What opponents of the term “hate crime” get right however, is that the laws are sometimes so ambiguous that a clever prosecution can convince a jury that a wide variety of crimes meet the legal definition of a “hate crime” and that they have to convict based on the definition alone, regardless of common sense.  We have seen “terrorism” laws abused in this same way.  I would not be at all surprised if Ravi’s case someday reaches the Supreme Court for this very reason.

I consider Ravi a “casual homophobe.”  He, like many of us, especially when we were younger, may loosely throw around the word “fag” or an occasional “you’re so ghey” without thinking twice.  As he gets older he will think about it more, just like many of us may have.  First generation South Asian American households are not the greatest environments to be raised socially conscious in.  With age he may have checked himself and seen that words can hurt like weapons.  Becoming popular with friends by poking fun at others would stop being as cool as it once was. We’ll never know now cause he just got Shawshanked.  He may even be deported.

Now, about the second major issue this jury may not have appreciated enough in terms of considering the applicability of some of the bias intimidation charges:  Nobody ever commits suicide because of a single reason.  Any mental health professional or suicide prevention counselor will tell you that you can’t go from perfectly happy to suicide in the matter of days.  Being watched shirtless on a webcam with another man for two seconds did not alone intimidate Clementi into killing himself.  I fear this ruling sends a message that suicide is clean and simple to understand.  ”A” leads to “B.”  Just punish “A” and there will be no “B.”  Simple.  Why do we need to invest in mental health or provide resources for gay teens coming of age?  Let’s just make it a crime to be an asshole.  Most importantly, Ravi’s defense team was barred from accessing Clementi’s computer files or a note left in his backpack.  There they may have found the evidence they needed to demonstrate that Clementi’s state of mind was complicated and impacted by a lot more than boorish behavior by a freshman year roommate.

Speculating for a second it seems like the jury, like much of modern society, was more interested in being fair (and in sticking to the prosecution’s interpretation of the law) than in being just.  It is sad that Clementi was troubled.  It is even more tragic that he took his life.  I get the impression that the jury sought to punish Ravi because they felt bad about Clementi and his family’s situation rather than being motivated by the need for meting out dispassionate justice.  As a society, when we punish “bad thought” (especially in the young) and blur the line between it and “bad action,” we not only risk censorship but we push real ignorance or bigotry under the rug without dealing with it.  Now, more than ever, we have become a society that favors punishment over rehabilitation.  It is telling that the prosecution offered Ravi a plea bargain consisting of only community service…but a jury of his “peers” goaded by that same prosecution then threw the book at him after he refused to admit guilt.

“This was very difficult, but it was a really good experience. You feel like justice has been served,” he said.

He said decisions on the charges of witness tampering, evidence tampering and invasion of privacy were “easy” and “cut and dry,” but the deliberations on the bias charges were more difficult. He estimated the panel deliberated for much more than one hour on the bias charges, but would not say how long.

“You can’t know what someone’s thinking. You have to get inside their head,” he said. “Afterwards, you think about it not being done once, but being done twice another day. That’s why we came to that conclusion.” He also said he hopes the verdict will bring some peace to the families.

“I hope they can put everything behind them and move forward,” he said. “Hopefully, they finally have closure.” [Link]

Ravi’s team will appeal but his life is destroyed now.  In America you can be 14 and put away for life.  You can be 18 and be jailed for being immature and insensitive.  Everyone lost in this episode.  Especially justice.

It is fitting that Tyler Clementi’s dad basically paraphrased Gandhi at the end of the day, maybe without even knowing it:

To our college, high school and even middle-school youngsters, I would say this: You’re going to meet a lot of people in your lifetime. Some of these people you may not like. But just because you don’t like them, does not mean you have to work against them. When you see somebody doing something wrong, tell them, “That’s not right. Stop it.”

You can make the world a better place. The change you want to see in the world begins with you. [Link]

I met Prerna Lal last summer at Netroots Nation in Las Vegas. I quickly learned that she was a quite the firecracker. Desi via Fiji, Prerna is a founder of DreamActivist, a current law student, a writer, a SAALT Changemaker, queer, an activist and… is undocumented. Her journey as a struggling youth trying to navigate the broken immigration system is one she is very vocal about sharing, whether on blogs or on twitter. Her tenacity is one to be admired and bravery is one to be inspired by.

Just a few months ago, Prerna was served deportation papers – but being who she is, she’s not leaving without a fight. Here’s what she had to say.

Taz: What made you tweet this?

Prerna: It’s how I feel on most days. We are always asked to prove our worth to our countries. But I have yet to have America prove its worth to me.

T: What is your legal status?

P: Out of status, allegedly accruing unlawful presence that could lead to a 10 year bar from the United States if deported.

T: Where are you from? How did you end up in the US?

P: Fiji Islands. Father brought me here when I was 14, kicking and screaming.

T: Your grandmother is a citizen, your parents are greencard holders and your sister is a citizen. How is it possible that you are considered undocumented?

P: That’s simple. I aged out at 21. You see, when a visa petition is approved, a family has to wait many years to actually get a “priority date” in order to immigrate legally. I was 24 by the time my parents received their priority date. Regardless of the fact that my name was on the original visa petition filed for my family, I was automatically castigated and separated from my family. My parents were no longer considered my “immediate relatives.” I find it morally repugnant, but I’m sure there are many young adults who have experienced the same horror of family separation due to an arbitrary age out of our control.

T: What hurdles have you come across in your attempt to be documented?

P: I received admission into several prestigious institutions out of high school but either the cost was prohibitive or the universities rescinded their offer after finding out about my status. I don’t have access to any financial aid so I went to community college and state schools instead and while they were much cheaper, I had to work full-time. After classes would end for the day, I would clean office buildings till the wee hours of the morning to afford my college tuition and make ends meet. I also don’t have the privilege of federal loans like other law students who can borrow up to $75,000 per year so I have to continue working while also carrying a full-time law school course load. Due to lack of identification, there are other struggles like inability to travel, inability to work legally and inability to drive legally, that people in my situation face. It is like a physical and emotional impairment at times. I avoided bars and night-clubs for a long time because it was too much of a pain to carry my passport everywhere.

T: How do you feel about the immigration debate being framed as a Latino/Mexican issue?

P: I have a parenthetical status in the immigration debate as someone of South Asian descent. Sometimes reporters are unwilling to interview me due to their own internalized racism — they want a Mexican-American or Latino. Other times, people automatically assume I am from Mexico and tell me to go back to Mexico. Once I saw a picture of mine floating on the internet where I had been given a Latino male name — Palacio. I found it quite offensive. That said, I have more Latino than South-Asian friends and realize that due to the border we share with Mexico, immigration is an especially volatile issue for Latino communities.

T: Do you pay your taxes?

P: There’s sales taxes that every immigrant pays. I also pay business taxes to the state of California. My family pays several thousands in taxes each year when property taxes are taken into account. They are subsidizing the education of American citizens while their own daughter cannot get any federal loans to go to college.

T: You are a big advocate on behalf of the Dream Act. What are you advocating for and why is it important?

I think i said it best in this post for SAALT:

” …I’m queer and undocumented. Along with undocumented youth from across the country, I’ve worked to rip the DREAM Act from the clutches of the non-profit industrial complex, to queer the immigrant rights movement and to create a culture of radical dissent and accountability….

I hope no one is waiting for the DREAM Act and other pro-immigrant legislation to pass. It’s erroneous to think that incremental reforms like passing a single piece of legislation would change our lives dramatically. Our movement is not about passing a piece of legislation. It is about creating and fueling spaces for dialogue and resistance, building structures and networks that work for those who have been historically disenfranchised and castigated, and becoming our whole selves again. It’s not about waiting for change or for the right time to demand solutions but demanding change and creating our own solutions. It’s about being undocumented, unafraid, unashamed and unapologetic — and that includes not blaming our parents for alleged transgressions, not feeding into the military industrial complex and not serving as part of the grand narrative that seeks to criminalize other immigrants.”

T: Last month you were awarded the Changemaker Award by SAALT and you wrote a really touching blog post afterwards. How did it feel to get that award, as a Fijian-Indian-American?

P: Surprised and shocked. I don’t necessarily identify as South Asian. I used to keep my distance from other Indian people and my own Indian identity. Once bitten, twice shy. As a teenager, I remembered them as friends who had laughed and ridiculed my gayness, family members who would belittle me despite my various successes and people who denied my Indian-ness by pointing out that I was from Fiji. I couldn’t relate to the women who would hold fasts for their husbands, the women who would suffer in silence or the women who caved to family pressure. Sometimes I thought there was nothing remotely desi about me besides the way I looked. My queer identity grew in opposition and direct denial to my Indian one.

Then one day I was getting recognized for my LGBT and immigrant rights work, in front of a room full of South Asian people, some of them who were queer themselves. I never thought I could feel whole in my lifetime but I was wrong. I like to think I’m evolving now and coming full circle. Right now, I’m more concerned about unearthing my own queer South Asian diaspora roots than belonging to any white gay politics masquerading as human rights for all, especially when it is white colonialism that repressed the various modes of sexualities in our cultures.

T: Do you identify as South Asian? What was life growing up in Fiji?

P: A lot of my consumption of Indian-ness comes from Bollywood and that is true for whether I was living in Fiji or America. But I’m not an Indian-American. I’m a Fiji-Indian American. To deny the Fijian part of me is to deny the history of my ancestors as indentured servants who were taken by the British to Fiji, away from their homes and families and compelled to build a new home for themselves in a completely foreign place. They were subjected to all sorts of abuses and finally compelled to leave the country after a hundred years of contributing to the social, economic and political fabric of the country. It’s not unlike what the United States is doing to me now — kicking me out of my home — only I have more rights and privileges than my girmitya great-great grandparents who crossed the Kala Pani.

T: You are a long time blogger and have written on change.org and your own site. How/why do you feel blogging/telling narratives is important to advocacy?

P: I think our stories are our best weapon against a system that suppresses and denies our truths. It is said that history is written by victors and I take that to mean that if I am writing my own story, I’m probably also victorious. At the same time, we have to be mindful that our personal narratives of pain and trauma, love and joy don’t conceal other narratives such as the subjugation imposed by neo-liberalism on our lives and bodies.

T: You’re getting hella educated and have lots of degrees under your belt. What do you want to do with these degrees?

P: Honestly, I actually want to write books, as in novels and maybe some non-fiction but I also don’t want to be known as yet another person of South Asian descents who writes those novels about painful and traumatic immigrant experiences. How contrived and cliched. One day, I want to be a tenure-track professor but personally, I’m just looking for love in my life.

Aren’t we all? To follow Prerna on her journey for love and justice, visit her blog www.prernalal.com, her tumblr The Queer Desi, her online art installation documenting stories of the South Asian diaspora, and her RedHotDesi twitter account. Keep dreaming.

Images of Prerna Lal found on her blog at www.prernalal.com

On Monday, the EEOC supported Hani Khan by filing a federal lawsuit against Abercrombie & Fitch for violating her civil rights by discriminating against her on the basis of her religion. As a hijab-wearing teenager, Khan applied for a job with a Hollister Co. shop (owned by parent company A& F) in the San Mateo, California, Hillsdale Mall. The manager told her about the store’s “look policy”–which Khan describes as clothes that convey a fun, beachy vibe–and said at work she’d have to wear a head scarf in the company colors of white, navy or gray. As she explains in a recent CNN interview, Khan didn’t really think about A&F’s controversial history. She wanted to work with friends in what she considered a fun job environment. So she wore flip flops, jeans, t-shirts and made sure her head scarf was in the required colors.

Khan worked without incident in the store’s stock room, a job that required she occasionally go out on to the floor to replenish the supply of clothing.

But on Feb. 9 [2010], Khan said a district manager paid a visit to the store, which is owned by Abercrombie & Fitch, and that’s when her troubles began. Though Khan never met or spoke to the manager that day, she said she was aware of him looking at her. (AOL)

Days later via phone an A&F HR representative asked her to remove her hijab during work hours, and suspended her when she responded that she could not due to religious reasons. The suspension was followed by her being fired. This stunned Khan, 20, who grew up in Foster City, California, and says she’s been wearing a hijab for most of her life.

“I’ve worn the hijab since kindergarten,” Khan said. “Nobody has ever had a problem with it. Even after 9/11, teachers and neighbors have always been very supportive.” (AOL)

Though A & F now has a Diversity and Inclusion initiative, it doesn’t seem to have a great track record when it comes to lawsuits, including those that involve discrimination.

Abercrombie & Fitch have lost or settled several other lawsuits over their look policy. In 2009 the company agreed to pay $2.2 million to settle a suit with California labor regulators over allegations it forced its employees to buy and wear its clothes while on the job. In 2004, the company agreed to pay $40 million to settle a federal class-action lawsuit alleging that it promoted white employees at the expense of blacks, Hispanics and Asians. In 2009 a young British woman also sued the company, winning £136 basic compensation and £1,077 for loss of earnings after the company forced her to work in the stockroom because of her prosthetic arm. (KQED)

As KQED also notes, Khan is one of three women suing A&F for either not hiring, or firing women wearing headscarves. Samantha Elauf, a teen who was also supported by the EEOC in her suit, was not hired at an Abercrombie & Kids store in Tulsa, Oklahoma, because the company claimed that her simply wearing a head scarf would be in violation of its look policy. The details make it sound like Khan’s case was an example of someone with a hijab slipping through an illegal hiring policy due to location (SF Bay Area) or the local manager, until higher-ups in the company took a closer look.

Would you want to buy from a store that wouldn’t hire you? What difference, if any, might it make to a shopper’s experience if a hijab-wearing teen was re-stocking tees or ringing up your purchases at the cash register?

SM on A&F c. 2005: Abercrummy & Fitch settles

Why am I telling you about this other perspective of Orange County? To give you context as you watch this video, released by CAIR-LA on Wednesday.

The above video was filmed at a rally in February, outside of a fundraiser for the Islamic Circle of North America, a charity driven international Muslim organization.

The event – held at Yorba Linda Community Center, a facility that has been frequented by Muslim families and businesses over the years – first became a target of anti-Muslim bigots over two of the fundraiser’s speakers, who were to speak on the importance of charity in Islam. [cair-la]

What was most disturbing to me, albeit not surprising since I’ve had to build relationships with Electeds in this region, is the statements that came from the politicians that spoke at the rally. Councilwoman Deborah Pauly clearly implied that all the Muslims should be murdered. In light of what happened with the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona, due to the hate sentiments fueled in the community (as well as by Sarah Palin) and a lunatic eventually retaliating with a gun shot in to head… Well. Can Deborah Pauly really be that ignorant to not make a connection that her words could have the same effect? Or maybe she knows, and simply doesn’t care.

Villa Park Councilwoman, Deborah Pauly, while addressing the crowd at the rally, appeared to threaten Muslim event-goers. Congressman Ed Royce (R-40), in a troubling trend of disparaging Islam and its followers, added fuel to the fire by encouraging protesters to continue on with their hate-mongering. The attendance of Congressman Gary Miller (R-42) was a clear surprise, since he previously has engaged with all constituents, including Muslims, toward a better America. [cair-la]

But this situation isn’t simply a one-off of crazy tea-baggers in Orange County. There have been a string of Islamaphobic stories recently in Orange County – from the protesting of the construction of mosques to a hijabi woman fighting for her job at Disneyland because she wanted to wear her hijab to work. But the biggest story currently comes from UC Irvine, with the case of the Irvine 11.

The students — 8 currently at UC Irvine and 3 UC Riverside graduates — were charged with with two misdemeanor counts of conspiracy to disturb a meeting and disturbance of the meeting by the Orange County District Attorney’s office on Friday, only a few days after a protest was staged outside of the DA’s office in support of the so-called ‘Irvine 11.’ > The incident prompted the suspension of the school’s Muslim Student Union group and sparked debates on campus regarding limitations on free speech…[huffpost]

Since when did the District Attorney’s office get involved when students spoke out against a speaker on a campus? Students do this all the time on university campuses and they never get criminal charges. As the above video shows, this is a clear case of double standards and a racist example of selective punishment in the criminal justice system.

In comparison, none of the protesters in the first video were pressed with criminal charges. Even with Councilwoman Pauly’s veiled threats.

Racism still exists, both on the ground and in navigating the legal system. It pains me to hear people say that racism is no more when this incident just happened last month and hate was hurled at young children walking into a space, just because they were wearing hijab. I would go as far as to say that because Orange County is a minority majority now, these two incidences are a clear reflection of the fear felt by the now “minority” Whites. They are scared, and they are backlashing.

One final video, to cleanse your palette. I dedicate this one to all the bigots that stumble upon this site today. This one is for you.

And just to nip it at the bud, yes this is a Desi story. Look at the faces in the video, this a Desi-Muslim narrative. Not Muslim, so you don’t care? You should because in case it wasn’t clear from the video, these protesters aren’t very smart and won’t be able to differentiate the differences in the Brown Muslims, the Brown Hindus and the Brown Sikhs. If there ever was an example where Desi unity is needed to stand up to bigoted sentiments, this would be it.

Earlier this week, a federal jury found that an ex-LAPD officer was responsible for the wrongful death of an autistic man shot and killed in Hollywood in 2008. On Wednesday, the jury awarded the victim’s family $1.7 million.

Since the killing, Cruz has insisted that Chaudhry tried to attack him with a knife and that he fired his gun in self-defense. On Monday, however, after four days of testimony, the jury rejected Cruz’s account when it returned a unanimous verdict finding that the ex-officer had used excessive force and acted in “a reckless, oppressive or malicious manner” when he shot Chaudhry.[latimes]

Clearly $1.7 million is not equivalent to the cost of one life, but it does signal to the LAPD that they simply cannot afford to make mistakes. What I found most fascinating about the case was the evidence pointing out the knife was planted by the LAPD and that the police officer knew the name of his victim.

During the trial, lawyers for the Chaudhry family presented evidence aimed at putting doubt in the minds of the jurors over Cruz’s account. Testing on the knife that Cruz said Chaudhry had used, for example, found one person’s DNA profile on the handle and blade but showed that the DNA was not Chaudhry’s. Also, after Cruz said he had never met Chaudhry before the shooting, a man testified that he had been present on multiple occasions when Cruz confronted Chaudhry and called him by name.

After the verdict, the jury was asked to decide how much money, if any, to award Chaudhry’s parents. Attorneys representing Cruz and the city of Los Angeles had tried to limit the size of the award by arguing that Chaudhry had had a frayed relationship with his parents that lessened their suffering.[latimes]

Condolences to the Chaudhry family. You can read Usman’s brother’s Tumblr page following the case right here. Though nothing can bring their son back,there is some vindication in knowing that some form of justice was delivered, particularly in this time of heightened police violence. But in the end, $1.7 million is still not enough.

As I continued to watch Obama he then opined that, “Children should not have to pay for the sins of their parents” (a statement in support of the DREAM Act). I stood up and cheered in front of my TV. Again, I feel you, Mr. Obama. I know what it means to want to create a life for oneself beyond the choices of one’s parents.

“Get to the point, Radhika. Where exactly do you stand & why should I care?”   I am not trying to make this about my own state of flux or confusion, although I acknowledge that must be partly what comes through. It is about real lives that hang on the whims and winds of the political climate. It is about how those same people are seeking stability and happiness. In order to achieve that, we must elevate the discourse and cut past the media hype. Most importantly, we must educate Americans who may not have experienced the trials and tribulations of immigration themselves. Because the stories of those who have done so should and must influence our nation’s dialogue on immigration.

The bill is a reaction to the fact that Shahzad was read his Miranda rights, something that Lieberman claims will make it harder to fight terrorism even though (a) anybody arrested in America is read their rights (citizen or not) and (b) Shahzad has been singing like a canary.

Why will Lieberman’s political grandstanding effect you? After all, you’re not planning on becoming a terrorist. One reason is that the Lieberman’s remarks suggest that this bill will be incredibly broad:

under federal law, the “choice” to affiliate or associate with terrorism may be an innocent, unknowing financial sale or purchase, or it may simply entail making a charitable donation for humanitarian purposes to a group that the executive branch suspects of terrorism. [cite]

Remember that under current law, even human rights advocates working with non-violent political groups to help them resolve their conflicts non-violently can be charged with giving material support to terrorists if they also have an armed wing which is classified as a terrorist organization.

Another reason why you should be worried is that he is suggesting doing this by administrative means, even though you would have the right to contest such a finding in court:

Who would determine whether you’re involved with a foreign terror group? The State Department. It already decides what is and isn’t designated as a terror organization. Lieberman’s law would also empower State to determine whether you are in league with one of these groups. [WaPo]

This is in violation of any common sense reading of the 14th Amendment and also of Afroyim v. Rusk, although there is always room for constitutional lawyers to debate such points.

So why does Lieberman want to do this? Because he thinks he’s right (despite the logical inherence of his argument and its probable unconstitutionality) and he knows it’s popular. After all, the average American thinks this will only happen to other (read BROWN) people and for all the noise made by the tea party about restricting goverment powers, none will give a damn about this major grab. The sad irony is that Lieberman and McCain were once seen as the moderate sensible senators. With moderates like this, who needs extremists!

The most detailed summary of the reforms are at the Center for American Progress. I would recommend readers read the whole article, but here is a list of the changes that will affect the relationship between Parliament and the President:

Removing presidential powers to circumvent the normal legislative process and limiting the amount of time the president may consider bills passed by parliament before approving them (Article 75)

Transferring the power to submit matters directly to parliament for a yes or no vote to the prime minister (Article 48)

Removing the infamous Article 58-2(b) instituted by President Musharraf, which granted the power to unilaterally dismiss parliament under vague emergency provisions

Consulting with the outgoing prime minister and opposition leader on presidential appointments of caretaker governments to manage the transition to a new government when parliament is dismissed (Article 224) ()link)

And that’s just one part of the Amendment. The part of Amendment 18 that leaves open some future areas of contention is the reform of the judiciary appointment system, where it seems like some of the planned changes are still up in the air. According to the CAP author, the most contentious issue in the Amendment thus far has actually been the plan to rename the NWFP along ethnic lines, as Khyber-Pakhtunwa. Riots by members of the Hazara community in the region have left several people dead. It’s too bad that there is some dissatisfaction, but the change does certainly make sense to me — Northwest Frontier Province is an old, colonial name that only made sense under the British Raj.

I’m curious to know what readers who have connections to Pakistan think of the changes. Will they be good for Pakistan in the long run? And what about India-Pakistan relations? Overall, I think it’s a really impressive roll-back of executive power — the real end of the Musharraf era, if you will. President Zardari has exceeded my expectations.

The property of the Hindu Temple of Georgia was sold to the highest bidder Tuesday at a public foreclosure auction in Gwinnett County. It was unclear who bought the nine-acre property at 5900 Brook Hollow Parkway in Norcross following the temple’s default on a $2.3 million bank loan. A Gwinnett County court clerk said it typically takes about 30 days for a deed to be recorded after a foreclosure sale occurs. (link)

The person who ran the temple is the real story:

Lloyd Whitaker, a trustee appointed by a federal bankruptcy judge, said Anderson Lakes had intended to bid on the parcel. Court documents filed by the trustee this week say the temple’s leader and guru, Annamalai Annamalai, has been using the temple to “defeat justice, perpetuate fraud, and to evade contractual and tort responsibilities” since it was set up in 2006.

The trustee’s investigation has so far revealed that Annamalai, a citizen of India, applied for a work visa in 2007 under the pretext of working as an accountant for the temple for $40,000 a year. Yet Annamalai’s business records list his income at upward of $425,000 last year alone, court documents show. He has never filed federal or state tax returns, and the Internal Revenue Service has launched a criminal investigation into Annamalai’s financial dealings.

Financial documents obtained by the trustee also show that Annamalai has funneled money from the temple to other business entities that he controls, to accounts in the names of his wife and two children and to several of his priests. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in temple funds were used pay for the mortgage on Annamalai’s million-dollar mansion in Duluth, as well as his luxury vehicles and credit card bills, according to the court record. (link)

Why might all this be of interest, you may wonder.

Well, this past summer, Abhi and I received a “cease and desist” letter from attorneys representing the priest named in the AJC article asking us to delete a blog post I wrote in 2008 related to the Hindu Temple of Georgia. We also received a subpoena regarding the identity of a commenter on the comments thread following the post (someone who clearly had links to the Temple, not an ordinary commenter). My own first thought was that I was ready to basically give in to the threat, just to make it go away. At the time I got the letter, I was in a a bit of a blogging hiatus, and I had little interest in dealing with a potentially costly and time-consuming lawsuit related to something I had posted on Sepia Mutiny.

But after consulting with Abhi and a lawyer friend of Abhi’s in New York, it was decided that we would say no to the Cease and Desist: the blog post stayed, effectively unaltered. (As an attempt to mollify the Temple after getting several harassing phone calls from them, I had already added, some weeks earlier, one small update, indicating that one set of fraud charges against the Temple had been dropped.)

Nothing I had said in my original post could reasonably be construed as defamatory. Indeed, I had gone out of my way in the original post to try and see things from “Commander Selvam’s” side of things, pointing out that some aspects of the Fox 5 Atlanta story on him seemed somewhat exaggerated. Even the subtitle of the post seemed fair: “What do you think?”

By refusing to delete the blog post in question, we knew there was a significant danger of getting sued. Through a consultation with a journalist interested in the case we learned that the temple had already filed suit against at least one major media organization. They were also suing virtually everyone who had spoken out against the temple in any of the news coverage surrounding it, not to mention former temple employees.

Our lawyer friend also counseled us that we could ignore the subpoena regarding the identity of the commenter on the blog post in question. We also followed that advice; we let the comments stand, and did not reveal their IP addresses to the Temple.

Given how many lawsuits these guys were involved with in Gwinnett County, the writing seemed to be on the wall. I started talking to lawyers I knew in the Atlanta area, and began checking Orbitz to see how much it would cost me if I had to fly down to deal with what seemed like an inevitability.

But amazingly, we didn’t get any further correspondence from the Temple.

And then, on September 1, the Temple filed for bankruptcy. The stories in the Atlanta press, as well as at Fox 5 Atlanta, suggested that virtually no one in Atlanta was frequenting this particular temple anymore. (There are several other Hindu temples in Atlanta — all respectable institutions. After the bad press started coming out, folks who had been going to this particular temple had apparently started going elsewhere.)

On November 19, there was this story in the AJC, suggesting that both local and federal law authorities were aggressively moving against the head of the temple. The IRS was pursuing criminal charges, and the USCIS was planning to revoke the Commander’s visa.

And this week, the temple property was sold in foreclosure — meaning this particular story is probably at an end.

What did we learn? Aside from being gratified to see that a principled stance could acutally pay off, I learned a little bit about laws regarding defamation and how they affect blogs. You can definitely be sued for something you say about someone on a blog if it is defamatory. Most times, you are not liable for something a commenter might have said in the thread responding to your post — along the idea that a comments thread is like a public forum (AOL cannot be liable for everything people say in their chat rooms…). However, in at least one case, a blogger was held liable for defamatory statements on his blog, because the court found evidence that he had been an active moderator of the comments thread.

Readers who also have their own blogs might want to keep some of that in mind..

As many people are aware, the Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) was an American company. The plant was technically operated by its subsidiary, Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL), which was 51% owned by UCC at the time of the disaster.

In one of the strangest, and most fateful, twists in the legal history of the Bhopal disaster, a U.S. District Court decided in May, 1986 that UCIL was an Indian company (“a separate entity, owned, managed and operated exclusively by Indian citizens in India”), and therefore any litigation regarding the Bhopal disaster should be done in India. The decision by the District Court was upheld on Appeal.

The transfer of legal authority — in effect, the U.S. justice system saying, “hey, this is not an American company, so it’s not our problem” — significantly weakened the damages that were likely to be rewarded. Indeed, the final damages, reached in an out of court settlement, was only $470 million. When all was said and done, that came out to $2,200 for each person killed, and about $500 for each person injured. Neither UCIL nor UCC ever had to acknowledge culpability, or take responsibility for cleaning up the still polluted site of the Union Carbide Plant. A Dow Chemicals executive later stated that the amount “is plenty good for an Indian.” Even with the conversion to Rupees, I can’t see how $500 is a significant help for a person who may be living with a debilitating injury, with children who are born, even years later, with serious congenital birth defects associated with (still) poisoned groundwater. It’s not “plenty good”; it’s laughable.

A commenter on Sandhya’s earlier thread mentioned the Sambhavna Clinic, which was built specifically to care for victims of the disaster. There is a “donate here” button; if you have a couple of bucks to spare, you might use it.

Finally, Suketu Mehta has a column up in the New York Times today. He does lament that Dow Chemicals hasn’t done anything to help clean up the site. But what he doesn’t mention is that the reason for that is that the U.S. justice system washed its hands of the mess in 1986, and the Indian Government, which is the only entity that today has any legal responsibility to do anything for anyone in Bhopal, meekly accepted it.

What are your thoughts today? Have you read anything insightful or enlightening with regards to the Bhopal disaster in recent days?