WASHINGTON - A Temple University physics professor who was charged with sharing scientific technology with China only for the case to collapse before trial and be dismissed by the Justice Department asked a federal appeals court on Monday to reinstate his clams for damages against the U.S.
government.Lawyers for Xiaoxing Xi and his wife say in a brief filed Monday with a Philadelphia-based appeals court that a judge erred last year when he dismissed most of the claims in their federal lawsuit.
They assert that the FBI agent who led the investigation "intentionally, knowingly or recklessly" made false statements and misrepresented evidence so that prosecutors could get an indictment."When law enforcement agents abuse the legal process by obtaining indictments and search warrants based on misrepresentations or by fabricating evidence, it undermines the legitimacy of the courts," Xi’s legal team, which includes lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union, wrote in the brief."The judiciary has a stake in ensuring that malicious prosecutions and illegal searches do not go unchecked, and the courts have well-established standards for assessing such claims," the brief says. "Moreover, the harm to Professor Xi, his family, and society at large, as well as the need to deter further misconduct, strongly weigh in favor of allowing these claims to proceed."In a statement provided by the ACLU, Xi said there was "clear evidence that the FBI violated our constitutional rights that day, and years later we are still dealing with the trauma of this ordeal.""If we can’t hold the government accountable now, there will be little to stop the government from profiling other Asian American scientists and ruining more innocent people’s lives.