Estimated read time: Less than a minute
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from a former top official in Somalia who has been ordered to pay Somali torture victims $21 million.
The justices did not comment Monday in letting stand lower court rulings against Mohamed Ali Samantar, who now lives the Virginia suburbs of Washington. He had previously been a top official in dictator Siad Barre's regime in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Federal courts found that Samantar could be held liable for human rights abuses and rejected claims that he should be immune because he was an official of a foreign government.
The case is Samantar v. Yousuf, 12-1078.
(Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
