On May 31, 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit seeking damages from former Attorney General John Ashcroft, filed by a U.S. citizen who alleged that his Fourth Amendment rights were violated when he was held for 15 days as a “material witness” in on-going criminal proceedings. Reversing a lower court decision, the Supreme Court held that dismissal was proper because Ashcroft had established a right to qualified immunity from the lawsuit. The decision was a victory for WLF and its clients (five former U.S. Attorneys General), who filed a brief urging dismissal. They argued that allowing the case – which was essentially a political challenge to Bush Administration anti-terrorism policies – to proceed through discovery threatened to interfere with the ability of high-level government officials to carry out their jobs effectively. The former Attorneys General who signed the brief were William P. Barr, Benjamin Civiletti, Edwin Meese III, Michael Mukasey, and Dick Thornburgh.