Exclusive: 9-11 news direct from New Hamphire
NH widow fights 9-11 estate challenge linked to President Bush
by Tom Flocco
Derry, New Hampshire--September 24, 2004 Posted 5:00 PM--EDT--TomFlocco.com--An attorney employed by a law firm with multiple ties to President Bush met with a 9-11 widow's step-daughter prior to her commencement of an estate takeover attempt which could limit the widow's future legal options as she seeks to hold Mr. Bush and others accountable for failures before and during the actual two-hour period of the attacks.
Ellen M. Mariani, a doggedly determined New Hampshire 9-11 widow, has been engaged in a year-long legal battle to maintain control of her late husband Neil's estate as she considers her future legal options while attempting to seek information, evidence, and accountability related to government failures before and during the September 11 attacks.
Ellen and Neil Mariani on their wedding day in 1998 (used with permission--from the private photo collection of Ellen M. Mariani)
This, in the face of an estateo challenge filed more than a year ago by Mariani's step-daughter Lauren Peters, who met with attorney Daniel Bakinowski in the Boston office of Greenberg Traurig--a Miami-based firm with several close links to both President George W. Bush and his brother, Florida Governor Jeb Bush. A few months later, attorneys from Massachusetts and New Hampshire helped Peters file a legal challenge to take control of the late Louis Neil Mariani's estate.
Greenberg Traurig represented President Bush in the Bush-Gore 2000 Florida election vote recount, a Greenberg attorney personally represents Governor Jeb Bush, Greenberg Traurig hired the son of
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia on election day 2000--after which Justice Scalia cast one of the deciding votes which placed Bush in the presidency about seven weeks later, and the Miami-headquartered firm partially funded and sponsored a delegation to Israel of House-Senate Armed Services Committee members and government contractors who witnessed and were briefed on interrogation resistance procedures and torture techniques--according to an Army Major General.
Mariani knows a witness to the encounter who personally met and conversed with Lauren Peters since she was also in Boston's Greenberg Traurig office with Mariani's step-daughter on the same day and recognized Peters.
The woman is also a 9-11 widow and has told several others about the incident in Greenberg's Boston office, after introducing herself to Peters since she recognized a photo of Neil Mariani on a pin
Peters was wearing when they met outside BakinowskiĄŻs office.
During a recent deposition under oath, Peters denied knowing Bakinowski but said she may have met someone named Greenberg in Boston but couldn't recall the meeting, according to Mariani, speaking exclusively to TomFlocco.com.
Mariani told us that Greenberg-Traurig attorney Daniel Bakinowski met with her late husband's daughter Lauren Peters in February 2003. However, before that time, Ms. Peters supported Mariani's suit against United Airlines (by law Peters participates in any settlement or judgement).
Since the meeting with Bakinowski, Peters has continued to press for administrative and financial control of Neil Mariani's estate, accusing the New Hampshire widow of incompetence in her capacity as estate administratrix because Mariani refused to accept a financial settlement from the 9-11 Victim Compensation fund.
More Bush-Greenberg relationships
Besides Greenberg Traurig's legal representation of Bush 2000 in the Florida election recount, other Greenberg-Bush relationships include: prominent administrative positions in the Massachusetts 9/11 Fund also involving Bush family banking house Brown Brothers Harriman, Greenberg's Alberto Jose Mora--appointed General Counsel of the Department of the Navy and its Office of Naval Intelligence just 90 days before the attacks, and Greenberg's Bush 2004 "pioneer" fundraiser and Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
One of the lobbyists accompanying the Greenberg-funded congressional and defense contractor delegation to Israel included Jack London, chairman, president and CEO of CACI International Inc., an American defense contractor firm implicated by U.S. Major General Antonio M. Taguba in the torture of Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison, according to a report leaked by Taguba. (Lebanon Daily Star, 5-11-2004)
The Greenberg firm was fined $77,000 in 1998 for soliciting an illegal foreign political donation from German citizen Thomas Kramer; and Greenberg partner Marvin Rosen, Democratic National Committee (DNC) finance chairman, supervised the activities of convicted fund-raiser and DNC vice-chairman of finance John Huang who had to return half of the more than $3 million raised by Huang in contributions from illegal foreign sources, according to World Net Daily (11-16-2000)
A primary precondition for joining the 9-11 victim compensation fund--a litigation issue--is to waive any and all future legal claims against the government for actions such as allowing the attacks to happen as alleged in Mariani's original Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organization (RICO) suit against Bush and other administratin officials.
By refusing to enter the fund, Mariani has declined to accept compensation which has thus far averaged $1.6 million in payouts. Virtually all outspoken and media-visible victim family members have opted to accept money from the government as compensation for their loss in return for promising never to sue Mr. Bush and others for their actions on 9-11. Mariani refuses to be paid off by the government.
Ellen Mariani became a student of the September 11 attacks. She spent hours in front of the computer screen in her New Hampshire office where we found her searching for more evidence. The New Hampshire widow speaks throughout the United States and foreign countries about unanswered questions related to 9-11. Mariani is also regularly interviewed on radio and cable television news programs to discuss the actions of the president during the attacks--at the same time victims were jumping to their deaths from the World Trade Center towers. (photo by Tom Flocco)
Mariani said she is seeking an explanation for the presidentĄŻs strange actions during the actual two-hour period of the attacks--given multiple intelligence warnings, the 1993 World Trade Center attack, and Genoa, Italy G-8 meetings--protected from Arab suicide air attacks by anti-aircraft guns. But the widow is also questioning why there was no military response since air traffic controllers said the first plane was considered hijacked at 8:13 am--33 minutes before it impacted the north tower; and nearly two full hours passed with no air defense before the fourth plane crashed.
