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Wadih El-Hage, 40, is a naturalised American citizen who was born in Lebanon. He was Osama bin Laden's personal secretary. He was accused of being the key organiser of the Kenya cell and of setting up front companies in Kenya for Al Qaeda. He left Kenya almost a year before the bombings, after being questioned by the FBI in Africa. At the time of the bombings, he was living in Arlington, Texas, with his wife, April, and seven children. El Hage claimed he only worked for bin Laden in legitimate businesses and had no contact with him since 1994. El Hage was charged with conspiracy to murder Americans.

On 29 May 2001, El Hage was convicted for conspiracy to kill United States officers and employees engaging in official duties and conspiracy to destroy buildings and property of the United States. In addition, he was found guilty of giving false statements to a federal jury (perjury). On the basis of this conviction, El Hage was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of being released.

On 24 November 2008, the Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction of El Hage and returned the judgment for reconsideration of the sentence because the District Court made procedural errors. El Hage was sentenced again to life imprisonment.

After the civil war in Papua New Guinea, which led to Bougainville obtaining a more autonomous position, several inhabitants of that island sued the mining company Rio Tinto, basically for its role in the war and the process leading up to it. The plaintiffs claimed that Rio Tinto’s mining activities had harmed their health and the environment, and that they had helped the Papua New Guinea government in, among other things, setting up a blockade with disastrous results for the population. They relied on the Alien Tort Claims Act, a US Act which permits aliens to present a claim in a US Court when, allegedly, the law of nations has been breached. Before the District Court ruled on this case en banc, two previous panels had ruled on this case, thereby mostly focussing on the question whether or not the case should be dismissed as it touched upon questions of US foreign policy, questions which should only be addressed by the Executive Branch of the government. The Court of Appeals en banc took a different route and stated that the District Court should assess in depth whether the fact that the islanders had not exhausted local remedies should lead to dismissal of the case. To this end the Court of Appeals established a framework of applying the ‘exhaustion principle’ and referred the case back to the District Court. 

In August 1998, the US Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by terrorists loyal to Osama bin Laden. In retaliation, President Clinton ordered a missile strike on the El-Shaifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan, arguing that it was a base for terrorism. Later, it was proven that the plan had no ties to terrorists. Therefore, El-Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries brought complaints against the United States in the US Court of Federal Claims.

In November 2005, the District Court found that El-Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries raised a non-justiciable political question (which foresees that courts have no authority to hear or adjudge on matters that raise political, rather than legal, questions) in asking the Court to adjudge on the President’s powers to designate as enemy property the private property of the chemical plant in Sudan.

On 27 March 2009, the Court of Appeals affirmed the decision of the District Court, holding that the case raised a political question, and therefore barring the court from hearing the matter.

El-Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries filed a petition to the Court of Appeals asking for the case to be re-heard by the court sitting en banc (where the case is heard before all judges of the court). On 3 August 2009, the Court of Appeals granted their petition, ordering that the case be re-heard by the court sitting en banc and vacating the earlier judgment of 27 March 2009.

Until July 1994, Michel B. was the managing director of OCIR-Tea, the controlling body for the tea industry in Rwanda. B. is accused of conspiring with his employees in order to kill Tutsis in the Gisenyi Prefecture. In addition, he was a member of the local committee of the Republican Movement for Development and Democracy (MRND) for the Gisenyi Prefecture.

B. was indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda on charges of genocide and, in the alternative, war crimes. He pleaded guilty to complicity in genocide and he was sentenced to 8 years’ imprisonment. The Tribunal found that B. had substantially assisted the military and the Interahamwe militia launch an attack against Tutsis at Kesho Hill and Nyundo Cathedral by authorising that vehicles and fuel from his tea factories be used to transport attackers, that personnel from the factories participate in the attacks and that the attackers be provided with heavy weapons. These weapons were then stored in his factory. The Accused also contributed financially by providing the Interahamwe with money to purchase alcohol so as to motivate them to continue with killings.