Thread: Some prisons are better than others

November 14, 2009
Accused 9/11 Mastermind to Face Civilian Trial in N.Y.
By CHARLIE SAVAGE

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration said Friday that it would prosecute Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-described mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, in a Manhattan federal courtroom, a decision that ignited a sharp political debate but took a step toward resolving one of the most pressing terrorism detention issues.

The decision, announced by Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., could mean one of the highest-profile and highest-security terrorism trials in history would be set just blocks from where hijackers for Al Qaeda destroyed the World Trade Center, killing nearly 3,000 people.

Mr. Holder said he would instruct prosecutors to seek death sentences for Mr. Mohammed and four accused Sept. 11 co-conspirators who would be tried alongside him.

But while the civilian system would handle those cases, he said five other detainees would be prosecuted before a military commission.

Those facing a military trial include Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is accused of planning Al Qaeda’s 2000 bombing of the Navy destroyer Cole in Yemen. All 10 detainees are being held at the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

“Today’s announcement marks a significant step forward in our efforts to close Guantánamo and to bring to justice those individuals who have conspired to attack our nation and our interests abroad,” Mr. Holder said.

No decision has yet been made about where to hold the military trials, Mr. Holder said. But the administration’s decision to bring five Sept. 11 detainees onto United States soil for prosecution in the civilian legal system drew immediate fire from members of Congress as well as relatives of victims and neighbors of the federal courthouse.

They argued that Qaeda suspects did not deserve the protections afforded by the American criminal justice system, that bringing them into the United States would heighten the risk of another terrorist attack, that civilian trials increase the risk of disclosing classified information, and that if the detainees were acquitted they could be released into the population.

“We should not be increasing the danger of another terrorist strike against Americans at home and abroad,” said Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York.

Senator Jim Webb, Democrat of Virginia, questioned the wisdom of trying terrorism suspects in civilian courts, arguing that military commissions were more appropriate. But many other Democrats praised the move, noting that New York had been the setting for other high-profile terrorism trials — including the prosecution of Omar Abdel Rahman, the “blind sheik” who was convicted of plotting to blow up the United Nations headquarters and other New York landmarks.

“New York is not afraid of terrorists,” said Representative Jerrold Nadler, Democrat of New York, adding, “Any suggestion that our prosecutors and our law enforcement personnel are not up to the task of safely holding and successfully prosecuting terrorists on American soil is insulting and untrue.”

Mr. Holder said he was confident that the men would be convicted, and other administration officials said they had ample legal authority to keep classified information secret. They also suggested that they could continue to detain anyone deemed to be a “combatant” under Congress’s authorization to use military force against Al Qaeda.

Mr. Mohammed and the other detainees would not be moved right away. Under a recently enacted law, the administration must give Congress 45 days notice before bringing any Guantánamo Bay detainee into the United States. Mr. Holder said the administration would comply with that requirement as it seeks indictments from a grand jury.

The decision to prosecute some detainees in civilian court was a major policy shift from the Bush administration, which contended that suspected Al Qaeda members should not be treated like — nor given the rights of — ordinary criminals. It had charged the Sept. 11 defendants before a military commission at Guantánamo, which has a more flexible standard for evidence.

Days after his inauguration, President Obama signed orders halting the Bush era military commission trials and instructing officials to shut the prison within a year. But it became clear that closing the facility would be easier said than done, as political and legal pressures made it tough to move terrorism suspects into prisons in the United States, and other countries refused to accept them.

In a speech in May, Mr. Obama said that some detainees would be tried in civilian court, but that others could be prosecuted before a modified system of military commissions. Congress recently enacted legislation adding safeguards to the panels.

Kenneth Wainstein, an assistant attorney general for national security during the Bush administration, said he took “great comfort” from the Obama administration’s decision to use commissions to handle detainees who cannot be tried in civilian courts for reasons of evidence, security or applicable charges.

“They made what I think for them was a difficult policy and political decisions to retain military commissions — to fine-tune them but retain them,” he said, characterizing Mr. Holder’s approach as a “good call.”

In his May speech, Mr. Obama also said some detainees who are deemed too dangerous to release but too difficult to prosecute could be brought to the United States for preventive detention — essentially holding them indefinitely without trial. Mr. Holder on Friday offered no new details about that plan, which has drawn fire from civil-liberties groups and local communities.

In July, a task force of Justice and Pentagon prosecutors developed a system for evaluating what to do with each detainee, taking account of factors like where offenses took place, the identity of victims, and the manner in which evidence was gathered.

There was an internal debate over who would ultimately handle what is likely to be among the most visible trials in years.

Some military prosecutors who had spent years building cases against the accused Sept. 11 conspirators wanted to keep them.

New York prosecutors wanted them, too, as did those in the Eastern District of Virginia, which has jurisdiction over the area surrounding the Pentagon, where one of the planes struck.

Mr. Holder said that over the past few weeks, he had “personally reviewed” the 10 cases and made the final determination about which system would prosecute the two sets of detainees. He also decided that the Sept. 11 prosecutorial team would include attorneys from the Eastern District of Virginia.

Political considerations did not come into play in his decision, he said.

On the morning before Friday’s announcement, Mr. Holder called Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York and Gov. David Paterson of New York to inform them of his decision. Mr. Bloomberg said that he supported having the trial in the city, and that its police force could handle any security issues.

“It is fitting that 9/11 suspects face justice near the World Trade Center site where so many New Yorkers were murdered,” Mr. Bloomberg said.

Civil-liberties and human-rights groups praised the decision to try the detainees in federal court. Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, called the announcement “an enormous victory for the rule of law.”

He also announced that the A.C.L.U. and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers would shut down a joint effort to provide defense attorneys for the detainees facing military commissions. They spent about $4 million on the effort, he said.

But civil liberties groups expressed disappointment that the Obama administration would continue to use military commissions — even with the modifications. They said they would continue to press for all detainees to receive regular trials or court-martials.

The prospect of prosecuting Mr. Mohammed and Mr. Nashiri has been particularly difficult because their defense lawyers are expected to argue that they were illegally tortured by the Central Intelligence Agency during their confinement. Both were subjected to waterboarding, a controlled drowning technique.

About 215 detainees remain at Guantánamo, although about 90 have been cleared for release. The task force is continuing to evaluate their cases and Mr. Holder is expected to make more announcements are expected in coming weeks.

An earlier version of this article referred incorrectly to the conviction of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman. Mr. Rahman was found guilty in 1995 of conspiracy to blow up buildings in and around New York.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/14/us/14terror.html?_r=1

Originally Posted by Flanders

Just what the hell is the rule of law? Does it mean the ACLU’s law? Does it mean Sharia law?

Right now its "Talmudic law" That means goyim are subject to the law an zionists are not.

No prison is even better than the best of prisons.

Why shouldn’t one Fadi al Maqaleh be allowed to sue for his release? And why would Hussein try to block the suit after giving enemy combatants all of the Rights American citizens have under the US Constitution? See the article for another mind-blower.

November 18, 2009, 4:00 a.m.
Leave It to the Generals
Judges should not undermine our military detention policy in Afghanistan.
By Stephanie Hessler

As the debate over whether to send more American troops to Afghanistan intensifies, our war efforts could be hindered by an unlikely source: the U.S. judicial branch. Federal judges are considering whether foreign al-Qaeda and Taliban supporters captured by the U.S. military and held at Bagram airbase in Afghanistan can sue the U.S. government to be released from custody. On October 30, Fadi al Maqaleh, a Yemeni citizen currently detained in Afghanistan, argued in a brief to the D.C. circuit court that he has the right under our Constitution to challenge his confinement in U.S. federal court. Despite his campaign promises to abandon the detention policies of his predecessor, President Obama has adopted the same position as President Bush and is trying to block al Maqaleh’s law suit from proceeding. On Monday, the Obama administration filed a brief urging the D.C. circuit court to dismiss the case.

Permitting enemy militants to sue their U.S. captors would overhaul the military’s entire detention system and severely disrupt the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. But one judge has already ruled in favor of al Maqaleh. In a stunning decision this spring, Judge John D. Bates of the D.C. district court declared that al Maqaleh has a constitutional right to bring a claim challenging his custody. The Obama administration immediately appealed to the D.C. circuit court, where the case is currently pending.

Maqaleh v. Gates is a watershed case because al Maqaleh is one of approximately 600 enemy detainees being held at Bagram. Most are Afghans who were captured on the battlefield and who might rejoin the fight if released. As an essential part of wartime strategy, capturing and detaining enemy fighters has long been considered indispensable for weakening the other side’s ground forces. (For example, the United States detained more than 3 million German soldiers in World War II.) A ruling for al Maqaleh would mean that — for the first time in our history — foreign-enemy litigants in an active war zone could flood our courts asking judges to order the U.S. military to release them from custody.

The case is also important because Bagram is one of the most crucial logistical bases in Afghanistan. Thirty miles north of Kabul, it comprises nearly 4,000 acres, and much of the military’s supplies for the region pass through, including weapons, equipment, and food. Located in the middle of a battleground, the base has been attacked several times since the war began in 2001. As fighting in Afghanistan escalates, Bagram remains one of the largest and most vital military facilities in the fight against Taliban and al-Qaeda militants. Requiring the airbase to facilitate detainee trials, counsel visits, and court preparation would pose a significant security burden.

Al Maqaleh argues that Article I of the Constitution bestows on him a right to challenge his detention, a right known as habeas corpus. The Obama administration contends that al Maqaleh — as an enemy foreigner, captured abroad and held in a war zone — has no legal right, under any statute or the Constitution, to challenge his detention. Indeed, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which bipartisan congressional majorities passed and President Bush signed into law, explicitly bars any U.S. court from hearing cases brought by alien detainees.

The Supreme Court, however, struck down part of the Military Commissions Act in the groundbreaking 2008 case Boumediene v. Bush. In a 5–4 opinion, the court declared that detainees held at the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp have a constitutional right to challenge their captivity in federal court. The decision hinged on the unique, century-long control that the U.S. exercises over the Cuban land — sovereignty so absolute that the Supreme Court concluded, “in every practical sense Guantánamo is not abroad.”

The decision prompted a vigorous dissent from Justice Antonin Scalia, who strenuously disagreed that Guantanamo detainees may dispute their confinement: “What competence does the Court have to second-guess the judgment of Congress and the President on such a point? None whatever. But the Court blunders in nonetheless. Henceforth, as today’s opinion makes unnervingly clear, how to handle enemy prisoners in this war will ultimately lie with the branch that knows least about the national security concerns that the subject entails.”

As Scalia predicted, the Boumediene decision has put the judicial branch on a collision course with the president and Congress. Al Maqaleh now asks that the Boumediene ruling be extended halfway around the world to Bagram Airbase. The Obama administration argues that even if the right to habeas corpus reaches Guantanamo (because of U.S. sovereignty over that land), it surely must not extend to an active war zone in Afghanistan (where no similar sovereignty exists).

There are three reasons the D.C. circuit court should reverse Judge Bates’s decision. First, nothing in the text of the Constitution grants enemy foreigners held in an active war zone the legal right to sue their captors. Indeed, legal precedent instructs that enemies held abroad have no such right. In a post–World War II 1950 case, Johnson v. Eisentrager, the Supreme Court considered whether German war criminals imprisoned in Landsberg, Germany, were entitled to habeas corpus. The court held that they were not: There has been “no instance where a court, in this or any other country where the [habeas] writ is known, has issued it on behalf of an alien enemy who, at no relevant time and in no stage of his captivity, has been within its territorial jurisdiction. Nothing in the text of the Constitution extends such a right.” (The Eisentrager precedent was not dispositive in the Boumediene case because of America’s unusual sovereignty over Guantanamo Bay.)

Second, the Constitution specifically grants the two elected branches of government the power to formulate military policy. The president is the commander in chief of the armed forces, and Congress may declare war and provide for its funding. This allocation of power provides accountability. Voters are particularly concerned about policies affecting our troops, as shown by the heated debate about boosting forces in Afghanistan. The two branches that are accountable to the American people, therefore, should generally make military decisions, without being undermined by the politically insulated judicial branch. When the executive formulates military strategy and Congress provides for its funding, both branches must consider the public will. But when a federal judge — with lifetime tenure — defies those choices, the American people’s power to self-govern is diminished.

Third, judges do not have the military training or expertise to know the damage that could result from allowing detainees to sue their captors. The executive branch attests that permitting enemies to bring such lawsuits could be crippling: It would have “serious adverse consequences for the military mission in Afghanistan,” according to the Justice Department. The result would be “disruption, distraction, burden, and loss of prestige of the command.” In reaching this conclusion, presumably the executive branch has drawn on the expert opinions and classified information of the Department of Defense, the CIA, and the National Security Agency. Federal judges — with no particular national-security training — are in no position to second-guess experts on this matter.

Let’s leave the Afghanistan war in the hands of generals.

Stephanie Hessler is an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute. She served as a constitutional lawyer for the Senate Judiciary Committee, where she advised on terrorist-detention policy.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q...BhZjQyNGM0ZTQ=

It is really simple. Prison Break is simple foder for simple minded people. Charmed is for kids. Lost on the otherhand is EXCELLENT. I mean, WTF is going on with this island. It is beautifully written and the set is gorgeous.

I'd never watched Lost until 1 week ago when I decided to rent season 1 on DVD. I am up to the latest TV episodes now. It is just that good.

I have read the instructions to send pictures to the board, this result is a very useful information for everyone in this forum.

Originally Posted by Flanders

He went on to explain that living conditions were infinitely better in a federal pen, not to mention meeting a better class of crooks.

Flanders since you are clearly dumb as a box of rocks. . .you need to spend time in both and give us accurate report. . . .I am sure that even your pea brain would realize that putting men in cages does not solve a single problem. . . . .

Originally Posted by Shamgar

Flanders since you are clearly dumb as a box of rocks. . .you need to spend time in both and give us accurate report. . . .I am sure that even your pea brain would realize that putting men in cages does not solve a single problem. . . . .

To Shamgar: Your position does not surprise me. You obviously believe that problems can be solved by legislating love. Imprisonment is not supposed to solve societal problems you pathetic liberal dimwit. It’s supposed to punish people who commit crimes as well as isolate criminals from society for a time; the more heinous the crime the longer the isolation.

Originally Posted by Flanders

To Shamgar: Your position does not surprise me. You obviously believe that problems can be solved by legislating love. Imprisonment is not supposed to solve societal problems you pathetic liberal dimwit. It’s supposed to punish people who commit crimes as well as isolate criminals from society for a time; the more heinous the crime the longer the isolation.

Flanders: Thank you for once again showing your limited mental capacity. . . . .which is why you couldn't address what I said. . . . anyone with more than two brains cells. . .would know that punishment is supposed to help deter crime. . . .which is a societal problem. . . .and anyone with more than two brain cells knows that placing people in a university of crime will produce better criminals. . . .also very upset criminals since isolating people is not a valid form of punishment. . . . but clearly you are not intelligent enough to "think out of the box". . .your "solution" is to throw more money at a failed system. . . . true sign of insanity. . .expecting a different result from the same failed box. . . .simpleton. ..