• You must be logged in to see or use the Shoutbox. Besides, if you haven't registered, you really should. It's quick and it will make your life a little better. Trust me. So just register and make yourself at home with like-minded individuals who share either your morbid curiousity or sense of gallows humor.

Sugar Cookie

Veteran Member
Bold Member!
Where does an alleged war criminal accused of torture and directing mass executions look for work while living in the United States? For Yusuf Abdi Ali, there was an easy answer: Uber and Lyft.

Within a couple of days of applying to be a ride-share driver, Ali said he was approved to shuttle passengers from place to place. He's been doing it for more than 18 months, according to his Uber profile.

When CNN reporters recently caught a ride from Ali, the former Somali military commander was listed on Uber's app as an "Uber Pro Diamond" driver with a 4.89 rating.
"I do this full time," said Ali, who drives in suburban Virginia. He explained that he prefers to drive during weekends because "that's where the money is."

Ali said he has driven for Lyft, too, but he prefers working for Uber. His white Nissan Altima had only an Uber sticker on it. Asked if the application process was difficult, Ali replied that it was a breeze.

"They just want your background check, that's it," said Ali, who was unaware that undercover CNN reporters were riding with him and recording the trip on video. "If you apply tonight maybe after two days it will come, you know, everything."

Ali's work as a ride-share driver raises new questions about the thoroughness of Uber and Lyft's background check process and the ease with which some people with controversial pasts can get approved to drive.

Ali has not been convicted of a crime, but a basic internet search of his name turns up numerous documents and news accounts alleging he committed various atrocities while serving as a military commander during Somalia's civil war in the 1980s.

His past was detailed in a documentary by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that featured eyewitnesses in northern Somalia who described killings allegedly committed under the direction of Ali, also known as "Colonel Tukeh."

One witness in the same village said, "He caught my brother. He tied him to a military vehicle and dragged him behind. ... He shredded him into pieces. That's how he died."

When asked, "Did you see Tukeh do that with your own eyes?" the villager replied, "Yes, and there are many people around who saw it."

Ali has denied all allegations against him.

This week, Ali is defending himself against a civil suit filed in federal court in Virginia by a man who claims he was one of Ali's victims in 1988. Farhan Mohamoud Tani

Warfaa alleged in court documents that Ali tortured and shot him and ordered bodyguards to bury his body. The guards recognized that Warfaa, a farmer, had not died and accepted a bribe from his family to release him, according to documents.


Warfaa, who has come to the United States to testify against Ali, is being represented by the Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA), a San Francisco-based nonprofit that seeks to bring alleged war criminals to justice. The suit accuses Ali of directing a "brutal counterinsurgency campaign that refused to distinguish between civilians and combatants" between about 1984 and 1989.

Although the case against Ali has been allowed to proceed in US civil court, no criminal court has jurisdiction to try Ali for alleged war crimes. The International Criminal Court (ICC) wasn't formally envisioned until 1994, following the genocide in Rwanda, and Somalia has never been able to develop a complete justice system that could embark on a war crimes tribunal.

When approached outside the courthouse this week, Ali declined to answer CNN's questions. His attorney, Joseph Peter Drennan, dismissed the allegations against his client, saying the suit was politically motivated to benefit Somaliland, a breakaway region of Somalia.

According to public accounts, Ali moved to Canada after the Somali military regime he worked under collapsed in 1991. He was deported after news about his alleged war crimes in Somalia became public through that CBC documentary.

Ali entered the United States on a visa through his Somali wife who became a US citizen. In 2006, his wife was found guilty of naturalization fraud for claiming she was a refugee from the very Somali clan that Ali is accused of torturing.

CNN's recent Uber ride with Ali was not the first time the network has caught up with him as he sought to make a living in the country.

In 2016, CNN reported that Ali had been working as a security guard at Dulles International Airport near Washington, DC.

He was fired from that job shortly after the CNN story aired.
17642
 
"Ali entered the United States on a visa through his Somali wife who became a US citizen. In 2006, his wife was found guilty of naturalization fraud for claiming she was a refugee from the very Somali clan that Ali is accused of torturing."

Wonder what was the outcome of that, prison or did they deport her? Scheming bastards, both of them.
 
As the head of the Somali National Army’s Fifth Brigade in the 1980s, Colonel Yusuf Abdi Ali (nicknamed “Tukeh”) terrorized the Isaaq clan in the northwestern region of Somalia, known today as Somaliland. One of his torture victims was Farhan Warfaa. Decades later, CJA, on behalf of Farhan, fought to bring his torturer to justice in a U.S. federal court, and won.

Early one morning in 1987, when he was only a teenager, Farhan was arrested by soldiers under the command of Colonel Yusuf Abdi Ali, also known as Colonel Tukeh, in what is now Somaliland. They took him and several of his neighbors to the Somali National Army base where – for months – they would be repeatedly interrogated, beaten and tortured. Farhan alleged that Colonel Tukeh interrogated him, after which Tukeh shot him at point blank range. Farhan testified at trial that Tukeh left him for dead and ordered his soldiers to get rid of the body. Miraculously, Farhan survived and was smuggled to safety.

Colonel Tukeh was one of the most ruthless commanders of the 20-year Siad Barre dictatorship and was responsible for the detention, cruel treatment, and death of a great many members of Farhan’s community during the country’s civil war. When Siad Barre was eventually overthrown in 1991, Tukeh fled to Canada and later became a permanent resident of the United States.

CJA filed suit on behalf of Farhan in 2004, alongside then-pro bono counsel Cooley LLP, seeking to hold Tukeh responsible for torture, extrajudicial killing, war crimes, and the systematic and widespread attack on civilians under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA). In 2007, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia administratively closed the case, pending determination of immunity issues raised in another case, Yousuf v. Samantar. Farhan’s case was reopened in 2011, only to be stayed a second time pending the Supreme Court’s decision in yet another case, Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. The court finally reopened the case in 2014 and denied Tukeh immunity from suit for torture and attempted extrajudicial killing, while at the same time dismissing all of Farhan’s mass atrocity claims under the ATS. Both parties then appealed to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In February 2016, the Fourth Circuit affirmed the lower court’s ruling that Farhan’s claims for torture and attempted extrajudicial killing under the Torture Victim Protection Act can proceed, and that former government officials do not enjoy immunity from suit for violations of jus cogens norms. Unfortunately, the court affirmed the dismissal of Farhan’s claims for war crimes and crimes against humanity pursuant to the Supreme Court decision in Kiobel. On June 26, 2017, the Supreme Court denied cert on both issues.

On May 21, 2019, a Virginia jury found Colonel Tukeh responsible for Farhan’s torture, though it declined to find liability for Farhan’s attempted extrajudicial killing. The jury awarded Farhan, who was represented at trial by CJA and pro bono co-counsel DLA PIPER, $500,000 in damages, including $100,000 in punitive damages. After years of seeking accountability, our client finally got his day in court, and prevailed.






 
Back
Top