Port Authority Is Held Liable in Bombing That Killed Six in 1993 Attack on WTC
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

A jury concluded yesterday that the Port Authority was liable for the 1993 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center that killed six and wounded nearly 1,000 people.
On February 26, 1993, an abandoned van packed with explosives exploded in an underground parking garage beneath the twin towers. At that time, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey owned the trade center.
Several Muslim extremists have been convicted in federal court and sentenced to life in prison for their roles in the 1993 bombing.
The lawsuit decided yesterday was brought by hundreds of survivors, victims’ families, and businesses seeking damages from the Port Authority for its negligence in preventing the attack. After many years of legal wrangling and delay, the trial commenced last month in Manhattan Supreme Court. The jury reached its verdict after two days of deliberation.
As part of the verdict, the jury was asked to assign a percentage value to the liability of both the Port Authority and the terrorists responsible for the blast. They concluded that the Port Authority was 68% liable and the terrorists 32% liable.
Separate trials will now be held to determine monetary damages in more than 100 other lawsuits. The settlement of those lawsuits could cost the Port Authority millions of dollars.
A spokesman for the Port Authority, Pasquale DiFulco, said yesterday it plans to appeal the verdict. “The 1993 World Trade Center bombing was the direct result of a terrorist act, and those terrorists should be found liable. The Port Authority plans to appeal today’s decision, and we are confident that the facts and the law will support our positions,” he said. “To have a verdict where the Port Authority is held 68% responsible as opposed to 32% for the terrorists – it’s an obviously irrational, incorrect conclusion.”
An Associated Press report linked the jury’s decision to a 1985 security report commissioned by the Port Authority. The report warned the underground garage was a likely target for attack.
Jurors cited by the AP said they were swayed by the report, which lawyers for the plaintiffs said proved that the Port Authority could have avoided the attack. They said the Port Authority did not undertake appropriate security measures because of high costs and inconvenience. An attorney for the plaintiffs, David Dean, did not return phone messages from The New York Sun.
An attorney representing the Port Authority, Marc Kasowitz, told the Sun that the verdict would set a far-reaching precedent.
“To hold a victim responsible for the criminal acts of terrorists sends a horrible message. It is applicable to 9/11 and everything else,” Mr. Kasowitz said.
The attorney said the Port Authority’s appeal would partially focus on the fairness of the pre-trial instructions given by Justice Nicholas Figueroa. Both sides of the lawsuit were prohibited from evoking the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, in their cases.
Mr. Kasowitz said he was prevented from presenting evidence that linked the terrorists who orchestrated the 1993 attack to Al Qaeda, the perpetrator of the attacks on the same buildings more than eight years later. “The fact of the matter is, they were going to take this building down one way or another,” he said.
“The plaintiff’s argument was if the public parking was closed, then an attack would not have happened,” Mr. Kasowitz said. “But after February 26, 1993, we all know what happened to the World Trade Center. We were prevented from introducing that kind of evidence. We were precluded from referencing 9/11.”
An attorney who represents building owners, Daniel Ansell, told the Sun the verdict highlights an ongoing dilemma. “In New York, a building owner generally has no duty to protect against criminal acts unless those acts are foreseeable. The existence of an adverse security report apparently made it easier for the jury to find that the 1993 bombing was foreseeable and preventable,” Mr. Ansell said. “The decision illustrates the dilemma that owners face today in evaluating security risks and implementing appropriate measures.”
A senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, Walter Olson, told the Sun that the verdict could create perverse incentives for commercial landlords.
Mr. Olson said, “In order to avoid a legal nightmare,” landlords would have to either incorporate all security recommendations, at a great cost, or avoid commissioning the security reports altogether to eliminate a paper trail of liability.