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Home Front: WoT
Judge won't suspend Guantanamo trial
2009-01-29
A MILITARY judge at Guantanamo Bay today rejected President Barack Obama's request to suspend the trial of a Saudi accused in the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, the Pentagon said.

"Judge James Pohl denied the motion" put forward by the prosecution at Mr Obama's request to suspend the trial for 120 days, said Defence Department spokesman J.D. Gordon, confirming a report by The Washington Post. The Post said that Judge Pohl had found the government's argument "unpersuasive".
Are we being set up for Bambi's team to throw in the towel and refuse to prosecute anyone? After all, the bad mean judge won't cooperate with them.
The paper said the decision threw into disarray the administration's plan to buy time to review the cases against some 245 prisoners still held in the Guantanamo Bay camp in southern Cuba.

In his first full day in office last week, Mr Obama ordered the closure of the controversial detention centre within a year. But no decision has yet been made on what to do with the detainees still held at Guantanamo, most of them without charge, and many of whom cannot be returned to their home countries for various reasons.

Saudi defendant Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, 43, was due to say whether he pleads guilty or not at a hearing set before the Guantanamo military commission for February 9. Born in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, he allegedly conspired to help two Islamic extremists who steered an explosives-laden barge alongside the Cole, which was docked at the port of Aden, Yemen. The attackers then detonated themselves and their load.
Remember the USS Cole? Even if you don't like Iraq and find Afghanistan difficult, the whole Cole incident is easy. Terrorists blew a hole in the ship. We got their helper. He needs to be jugged for life.
Nashiri was arrested in 2002, and held in a secret CIA prison for almost four years before being transferred to the US military base at Guantanamo Bay, southern Cuba. In February, former CIA director general Michael Hayden confirmed that US interrogators had secretly used the waterboard torture technique on Nashiri (and two other detainees) while he was in the spy agency's custody.

Following Judge Pohl's decision, the new administration will now have to decide whether to withdraw the charges against Nashiri or not. He is one of six detainees who could face the death penalty if the charges are proven against him. "It's somewhat of a shock," Stephen Reyes, Nashiri's military defence attorney, told the Post of today's decision.
I'm shocked too, I figured the judge would stay everything until Bambi made the oceans recede ...
On the evening of his January 20 inauguration, Mr Obama's administration asked prosecutors to stay upcoming hearings of Guantanamo detainees for 120 days to allow time for a thorough review of the controversial military commissions. The following day, two military judges, including one trying the cases of five men accused of organising the September 11, 2001 agreed to the request.

Federal judges in the US District Court in Washington are also currently presiding over hundreds of cases brought by Guantanamo detainees challenging their detention, arguing they have the right to know the charges and evidence against them. In June, the Supreme Court granted these so-called "habeas corpus" rights to all detainees held at Guantanamo Bay.
Posted by:tipper

#1  I believe the gauntlet being place is "do I obey the law or do I obey Caesar"? Congress passed the law IAW their authority under Article I, Section 8.

Careful Bambi, its a trap. If you tell them to disregard the law, what's your defense when they do [and not just the laws you pick and choose].
Posted by: Procopius2k   2009-01-29 16:19  

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