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Iraqis decry settlements in Blackwater shootings
Several victims of a 2007 shooting involving American private security guards employed by the firm formerly known as Blackwater claimed Sunday they were coerced into reaching settlements and demanded the Iraqi government intervene to have the agreements nullified.
The Iraqis said they were pressured by their own attorneys into accepting what they now believe are inadequate settlements because they were told the company was about to file bankruptcy, that its chairman was going to be arrested and that the U.S. government was about to confiscate all of its assets. This would be their last chance to get compensation, the victims said they were told.
Though the company, now known as Xe, has not disclosed the amounts of settlements, media reports say they averaged between $20,000 and $30,000 for an injury and $100,000 for a death.
When criminal charges against the guards were dismissed Dec. 31 by a U.S. judge, the Iraqis concluded they had been duped and that the company was not in the kind of trouble they had been led to believe.