N002371
Tuesday, January 22, 2002 10:32 PM
Comments
Dear Mr. Feinberg,
I am respectfully submitting the following comments within the attachment.
Thank you,
Attachment 1:
Dear Mr. Feinberg,
This letter is to convey to you my concerns over the current format of the Victim Compensation Fund
I lost my husband and my two young girls lost their father on September 11th at the World Trade Center. While I am grateful for our government’s immediate response to this horrific event, upon closer scrutiny I am troubled by the current rules of the compensation proposal. Essentially, certain aspects of this proposal cause one to wonder if this proposal was created to truly compensate victims or to protect the airline industry. The conflict between these two very divergent goals is causing the families of victims considerable anguish in addition to the enormous grief which has taken up residence in every minute of our lives. This is because of the appearance that the government is trying to buy off families such as mine without giving fair and equitable compensation that respects our birthright as Americans to exercise our lawful prerogative to pursue our tremendous grievance in a court of law.
For example, the fund’s compensation offset for life insurance, pensions, and government benefits is patently unfair. It is perhaps the main element in this fund that appears to illustrate how this fund was created to protect the liability of the airline industry rather than to genuinely compensate the victim’s of this national tragedy. I especially object to the reduction of compensation for life insurance or pensions. To suggest that families of victims should be penalized because their lost loved one exercised wise planning and financial responsibly is profoundly unjust.
In bold stark terms, the purpose of the fund is to compensate people who are victims of a tragedy that has its origins in the failure of both private industry (the airlines and their private security firms) and various agencies of our federal government to protect us from terrorist treats that could well have been predicted and avoided.
What you are proposing is that we accept your compensation package in replacement of the normal lawful method of compensation by filing a civil suit in a court of law. But the current proposal doesn’t equitably replace one form of compensation with another. In reality, this proposal, which is designed with the interests of the airline industry in mind, proposes to the families of victims an option that denies us the right under law to reasonable compensation and punishes the heirs of my husband and many others who made financial and insurance decisions wisely, thoughtfully, and responsibly to protect their families.
Therefore, I respectfully request that the offset provisions in the legislation be eliminated which are inequitable and unfairly penalize some families and not others.
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
It is also completely unjust that we should be deprived of our full constitutional rights as potential litigants.
Individual Comment