The judge ordered Iran to pay the judgment. This latest judgment is added to many billions Iran has been ordered to pay in other judgments over more than a decade of such court suits.
The Islamic Republic argues that it cannot be sued in the US courts because it is a sovereign state. US law says that a sovereign state cannot be sued in the US courts except for a handful of reasons, one of which is that it is found responsible for terrorist acts against Americans.
Iran refuses to come into a US court to contest these cases, so it loses them one after another.
Judge Royce Lamberth of the US District Court for the District of Columbia has handled a large portion of these cases. Last month, he ruled on three suits involving the 1983 Marine barracks bombing, which killed 241 Marines, and settled on the payments due them.
Owing to the absence of Iranian assets in the United States, the victims involved in these many cases have never been unable to collect anything from Iran.
What assets Iran does have in the United States are, ironically, protected by the United Sttates government from being seized by the Americans who have won these suits. Although Iran complains constantly about the US order freezing Iranian assets inside the United States, it is that freeze that keeps those assets from seizure.
Last month, the Treasury Department issued its annual report on the frozen assets of countries determined to be terrorism-sponsors. That report says Iran’s cash assets in the United States now total $127.4 million in both blocked and non-blocked assets. In addition, the US government controls 11 packets of Iranian-owned real estate. The Treasury no longer issues a valuation for those properties, but the last time it did so they were valued at $22 million.
On top of these small amounts, however, property belonging to Bank Melli worth an estimated $2 billion is tied up in a court case in New York.
Separately, the State and Treasury Departments have designated 626 individuals and entities from dozens of countries for terrorist links and frozen their funds in the United States. The report says funds have been frozen from only seven of those 626. One of them is the Mojahedin-e Khalq, from which the Treasury has frozen $120,488 in funds.