Robert Gensburg (3 September 1939 – 9 November 2017)
/ref> was an American lawyer working in the state of Vermont.
Alt URL
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Gensburg was notable for advancing education-funding reform in Vermont; and for volunteering to assist a captive held in extrajudicial detention in the USA's Guantanamo Bay detention camp
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp ( es, Centro de detención de la bahía de Guantánamo) is a United States military prison located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, also referred to as Guantánamo, GTMO, and Gitmo (), on the coast of Guant ...
s, in Cuba.
On January 6, 2000, the House and Senate of the Vermont legislature honored Gensburg with a joint resolution, sending him their best wishes upon his having been diagnosed with leukemia.[
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State education funding reform
In 1997, as pro bono counsel for the ACLU
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a nonprofit organization founded in 1920 "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States". T ...
of Vermont, Gensburg successfully led a lawsuit arguing that the state's school funding formula was unconstitutionally inequitable for children in property-poor towns. This case, Brigham vs. State,[
]
resulted in Act 60 (Vermont law)
Act 60, known as "The Equal Educational Opportunity Act", was a Vermont law enacted in June 1997 by the Vermont legislature intended to achieve a fair balance of educational spending across school districts, independent of the degree of prosperity ...
, which established Vermont's equalized statewide property tax,[
]
intending to achieve a fair balance of educational spending across school districts, independent of the degree of prosperity within each district.
[
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Guantanamo clients
The Montpelier Times Argus reported that Gensburg had great difficulty getting to meet his Guantanamo clients.[Alt URL]
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Gensburg represented Abdul Zahir ʻAbd al-Ẓāhir ( ALA-LC romanization of ar, عبد الظاهر) literally, "servant (or slave) of the Evident (Outer)," "evident" or "outer" being a reference to Allah, is the name of:
* Abdul Zahir (politician) (1910 - 1983), Prime Minister o ...
, several other captives in Guantanamo, and a captive in American custody in Afghanistan.[
]Carol Rosenberg
Carol Rosenberg is a senior journalist at ''The New York Times.'' Long a military-affairs reporter at the ''Miami Herald'', from January 2002 into 2019 she reported on the operation of the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camps, at its nav ...
10th Guantanamo Captive Facing War-Crimes Charges
''Miami Herald
The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by the McClatchy Company and headquartered in Doral, Florida, a List of communities in Miami-Dade County, Florida, city in western Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County and the M ...
'', January 20, 2006[
]
Abdul Zahir was one of the ten captives who faced charges before a version of the Guantanamo military commission that was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
.
Wire tapped
Gensburg reported on October 2, 2007, that working for a Guantanamo client has led to his firm's phone, mail and email being intercepted.[
][
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A letter sent to their clients warned them of their belief the firm's communication was being intercepted, and stated:
Vermont Congressman Peter Welch spoke about the wiretapping of Gensburg's phones, and computers when he was interviewed on Vermont Public Radio's Vermont Edition
''Vermont Edition'' is a daily news and information program on Vermont Public Radio. It airs weekdays at 12 P.M. and runs for one hour. It is considered to be the flagship daily newsmagazine of VPR.
History
Vermont Edition first aired on VP ...
on Friday November 30, 2007.[
]
References
External links
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1939 births
2017 deaths
Guantanamo Bay attorneys
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