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Media Reports
Evans attorney appears
in Oscar-nominated movie
The Columbia County News-Times
By Jenna Martin
February 24, 2008
William Cassara, of Evans, has a role in a film that could
receive an Oscar tonight.
He isn't an actor. Instead, Cassara's profession as a lawyer
put him on the big screen.
"It's pretty neat, actually," he said, "I was quite
surprised to hear it."
Cassara lives and works in Evans as a lawyer in private
practice, most of which involves representing members of the
military.
 It
was that kind of work that led him to be filmed for Taxi to
the Dark Side , a nominee for best documentary feature at
the 80th annual Academy Awards, airing at 8 tonight on ABC.
The documentary, directed by Alex Gibney, investigates
allegations of abuse of detainees at detention facilities at
Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, Abu Ghraib in Iraq and
Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
"I'm not going to say I agree with everything that's in the
movie from a political standpoint, but that's OK," Cassara
said.
He defended Army Spc. Damien Corsetti, a military
intelligence soldier at Bagram and Abu Ghraib, who was
charged with various crimes after the Army's investigation
of prisoner abuse at Bagram, according to the film's Web
site. He was later exonerated.
Cassara appears in the documentary when he and his client
were interviewed about abuse allegations at Bagram.
Cassara said he has not seen the film, but his client has.
Corsetti told him that he doesn't agree with all aspects but
that the movie was powerful and well-made, the lawyer said.
Though Cassara hasn't watched the film, he said he probably
will watch the awards show.
"It's not that I did anything to earn it, but it is still
pretty intriguing," he said.
Other documentaries competing in the category are Sicko,
directed by Michael Moore; No End in Sight, directed by
Charles Ferguson; Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime
Experience, directed by Richard E. Robbins; and War/Dance,
directed by Andrea Nix Fine and Sean Fine. View
a clip of the movie here. |
