Mr. Eric A. Blinderman

Until the cause of the tormented became the pro bono passion of attorneys Eric A. Blinderman of New York and Christopher Nugent of Washington, D.C., these Iraqi refugees were left to the common cruelties of the Middle East and a painfully slow response to their plight from the U.S. government.
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Mr. Nugent and Mr. Blinderman have, in turn, recruited a total of 100 lawyers from their respective firms to aid those trying to escape Iraq, and those detained by authorities in neighboring states where torture is common - Syria, Jordan and Egypt in particular.
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"To be known to have associated with the United States is a death sentence," said Mr. Blinderman.

Having resettled at Proskauer last year as international litigation counsel, following a two-year hitch as attorney-advisor with the U.S. Department of Justice attached to the Regime Crimes Liaison Office in Baghdad, Mr. Blinderman, 34, estimates the number of Iraqi refugees worldwide at 4 million and counting.Of those, Mr. Blinderman feels a special obligation to English-speaking Iraqis who worked with U.S. and Coalition forces - Iraqis like "Ibrahim," who asked that his identity not be revealed.

"I worked for the U.S. government in many positions," said Ibrahim, who is now a paralegal at Proskauer, where he assists Mr. Blinderman with the firm's Iraq refugee project."Once you get that tattoo, once you even enter the [American-controlled Green Zone in Baghdad], you have collaborated with the Americans."

Ibrahim's salary, said Mr. Blinderman, is provided by an anonymous donor.Both he and Mr. Nugent are likewise circumspect about the matters they handle.

"Each case is tragic, each is very difficult, each requires a significant commitment of emotion and time," said Mr. Blinderman.
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While still in Iraq, Mr. Blinderman said he became aware of many other translators employed by the U.S.-backed Coalition Provisional Authority being kidnapped outside the Green Zone and tortured or killed - or their families killed.Working through the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr. Blinderman saw to it 30 of them were spirited out of Iraq to safety in the United States.
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Accordingly, Mr. Nugent and Mr. Blinderman divided the list: those still in-country seeking refuge in America went to Proskauer; those who had reached other shores and awaited transit to the United States went to Holland & Knight.
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Among those resettled is Ra'id Juhi Hamadi Al-Saiedi, the investigative judge in Baghdad with whom Mr. Blinderman worked in documenting the case against Saddam.
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Blinderman and Nugent have difficulties of their own in rescuing those Iraqis now in mortal danger because they believed their cause of a new Iraq was best served in aiding American interests.
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The pace of their rescue effort, said Mr. Blinderman, is "one by one by one."

Eric Blinderman is a young lawyer with a seriously full plate.A litigation associate at Proskauer Rose, Mr. Blinderman, 30, has put his financial future and his very life on the line with a pair of risks.

Tomorrow evening is the gala opening of "Mas," his hip, new French Provençal restaurant that takes its name from the regional term for stone farmhouse.With two partners, Mr. Blinderman said he has spent the past few years planning the West Village restaurant with the help of loans totaling nearly $1 million.But Mr. Blinderman himself will be absent on the big night.

Instead, he will be in Baghdad.On Tuesday, Mr. Blinderman hopped aboard a military jet bound for Iraq, where he has been asked to serve a 3- to 18-month tour as a civilian prosecutor for the war crimes tribunal now being formulated as the U.S.-led Coalition for Provisional Authority is scheduled to cede political rule in June to a sovereign Iraqi government in accordance with an interim constitution signed March 8.

"It could be a very good year, or a very bad year," Mr. Blinderman said last week during an interview at his Downing Street boîte, crawling with carpenters and other tradesman."I could get shot and go bankrupt, or I could see everything I believe in go right."

A graduate of Cornell Law School, Mr. Blinderman is more serious than his summation suggests.
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As an attorney with a keen interest in world affairs, Mr. Blinderman holds a master's degree in international law from Oxford University and has served as symposium editor of the Cornell International Law Journal.

He also contributed a significant chapter to "Forging Peace: Intervention, Human Rights, and the Management of Media Space" by Professor Monroe E. Price of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law and Mark Thompson of the International Crisis Group, based in Brussels, Belgium.

"Eric was a student of mine when I was at Cornell teaching a class in international broadcasting," said Mr. Price.
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Such an action was taken by U.S. troops in Iraq just before Mr. Blinderman flew to Baghdad.
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Eric's now there as part of the organizing effort for prosecutions."

While Mr. Blinderman is not at liberty to discuss details of his role as attorney-advisor to the general counsel's office of the coalition authority, Mr. Price explained, "He'll be involved in the investigative phase, the development of evidence and the discussion of what [international legal] standards should apply."
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"The situation changes, and I don't know what my responsibilities will be until I get there," Mr. Blinderman said last week.
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"Eric sees this duty in Iraq as an opportunity for a young lawyer with a certain expertise to do something that's in the [American] national interest, regardless of how you feel about the war," said Mr. Mashberg.
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I thought about it from the perspective of our firm, and how we're very excited for Eric, but frankly terrified at the same time.

"So I just basically told [Ms.Hoffman] that we're proud of Eric, and we're pulling for him," said Ms. Barkey.
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Not long ago, in fact, the partners reminded Mr. Blinderman that an American attorney who strayed beyond a patrol zone was killed.

"It's my goal to not get shot," Mr. Blinderman said.

On the subject of his restaurant gamble, he expressed confidence in his two partners' collective experience in opening 14 restaurants over the years, all of which are still in business.But if he should be the unlucky 15th, said Mr. Blinderman, "I'm young enough to make some big, stupid mistakes."

He then stepped from the construction zone of his new restaurant into the sun of an early spring day on Downing Street, where birds could be heard singing, to have his photograph taken.

Judge Navanethem Pillay, Judge, Appeals Division, ICC, Joel Simon, Deputy Director, Committee to Protect Journalists, Prof. Diane Orentlicher, Washington College of Law; UN Independent Expert on Update of the UN Set of Principles for the Protection of Human Rights through Action to Combat Impunity, Moderator: Eric Blinderman, Associate, Proskauer Rose LLP