The United States government formally apologized and will pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit brought by an Oregon attorney who was mistakenly accused of involvement in the 2004 Madrid, Spain, train bombings.

Brandon Mayfield had been arrested and jailed for two weeks as a “material witness” in May 2004 after FBI investigators mistakenly matched a partial fingerprint from the Madrid train bombing to him.

The FBI’s crime lab had matched the latent fingerprint, recovered from a bag of detonators, to Mayfield, while Spanish police pointed out repeatedly that the FBI had screwed up the match. The fingerprint was later matched to an Algerian man.

The settlement was filed in U.S. district court in Portland, Ore., on Wednesday.

Mayfield’s lawsuit alleged that his civil rights had been violated and that he was arrested because he is a Muslim convert who had represented some defendants in terrorism-related cases.

The settlement includes payments of $1.9 million to Mayfield and $25,000 each to his wife and three daughters, according to court documents. — Washington Post

The government also agreed to destroy materials it collected inappropriately when it had Mayfield under surveillance and delivered the following formal apology:

The United States of America apologizes to Mr. Brandon Mayfield and his family for the suffering caused by the FBI’s misidentification of Mr. Mayfield’s fingerprint and the resulting investigation of Mr. Mayfield, including his arrest as a material witness in connection with the 2004 Madrid train bombings and the execution of search warrants and other court orders in the Mayfield family home and in Mr. Mayfield’s law office.

The United States acknowledges that the investigation and arrest were deeply upsetting to Mr. Mayfield, to Mrs. Mayfield, and to their three young children, and the United States regrets that it mistakenly linked Mr. Mayfield to this terrorist attack. The FBI has implemented a number of measures in an effort to ensure that what happened to Mr. Mayfield and the Mayfield family does not happen again.

Earlier this year an internal Justice Department investigation (PDF) found that the FBI had not misused the Patriot Act in its mistaken prosecution of Mayfield, but that use of the Act had “amplified the consequences” of the FBI’s error.

The FBI denied that Mayfield was targeted because of his religion, but the inspector general’s report had said that because Mayfield is a Muslim and an attorney who represented defendants with suspected ties to terrorism, FBI examiners were more reluctant to consider that they might have made a mistake in their identification.

Mayfield continues to press a case challenging the constitutionality of the Patriot Act.

“The power of the government to secretly search your home or business without probable cause, under the guise of an alleged terrorist investigation, must be stopped,” Mayfield told the Post.