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| Ali al-Marri released from prison early, deported | |
| 2015-01-21 | |
| After more than 13 years in local, military and federal jails or prisons on terrorism-related charges, a former West Peoria resident is home in his native Qatar, leaving a series of short-term questions and long-term legal ramifications in his wake. Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, 49, was spirited out of the United States on Friday, two days before he was scheduled to be released from a maximum security prison in Florence, Colo. The move was a surprise to his attorney, Andrew Savage of Charleston, S.C., who had met with his client just one day before, on Thursday, though Savage declined to comment further on the unexpected release deportation until he could get more detail from authorities. Al-Marri had been slated to be released Sunday and deported to Qatar as he had finished his 100-month sentence imposed in October 2009 for providing material support to the al-Qaida terrorism network. An official with the Bureau of Prisons would not comment. A spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Saturday evening he could not provide any additional comment by deadline on the post-release deportation or any legal proceedings that may have preceded it. But the unanswered questions run deeper than how al-Marri came to be returned to his wife and five children ahead of schedule. The long-term legal ramifications of his groundbreaking case remain fuzzy. On one hand, the former West Peorian successfully challenged his designation as an “enemy combatant,” a legal designation that allowed the George W. Bush administration to hold him for years without charges and without many legal rights. But on the other hand, the U.S. Supreme Court wasn’t able to hear the case as planned as President Barack Obama, within a few months of being elected, ordered al-Marri charged in civilian court. “I am tempted to say, that we just don’t know,” said Carl Tobias, a legal professor at the University of Richmond School of Law. “The facts are just too unclear, so I am not sure where it leads us. There are a lot of ways to look at it, but you can’t just come to one conclusion. “It never really ended in a way that was a clear victory or that clarified the law,” Tobias said. A professor at Seton Hall University’s School of Law and a former member of al-Marri’s legal team disagrees. “While it is unfortunate the Supreme Court never addressed this extraordinarily important constitutional question, I do think that years of litigation and the attention around this case reinforced the idea that domestic military detention is a bad idea and bad policy,” said Jonathan Hafetz. “It is important to remember that even the Bush administration, which defended this case all the way to the Supreme Court, did not designate anyone as an enemy combatant after al-Marri was in 2003,” Hafetz added. Al-Marri was arrested at his West Peoria apartment three months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. For nearly two years, he was alternatively charged in federal courts in Manhattan and Peoria with credit card fraud and lying to the FBI.
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| Posted by:Steve White |