New attempt to stop war crimes trial
Tuesday, July 29th, 2008 6:56 pm Lyle Denniston
......
One of the Guantanamo Bay detainees facing war crimes charges claiming direct roles in the Sept. 11/ 2001, terrorist attacks - Ramzi bin al-Shibh - has asked a federal judge to block his trial before a military commission. Public defender lawyers for bin al-Shibh, in papers made public on Monday, argued that his trial should be blocked so that his lawyers can go ahead with their challenge claiming that the military commission system is illegal.
.....
The detainee is one of the four prisoners at Guantanamo - called “high-value detainees” by the government - who have been charged with crimes growing out of the 9/11 attacks. Military prosecutors have said that bin al-Shibh was “a coordinator of the 9/11 attacks.” He was captured in September 2002 at a site that prosecutors said was “an al-Qaeda safe house.” A date for his commission trial has not been set, but his motion said it was “imminent.”
.....
bin al-Shibh’s attempt to stop his war crimes trial is the second such attempt by a Guantanamo detainee. Salim Ahmed Hamdan - the first to go on trial before a commission at Guantanamo (he is not a “high-value” detainee) - failed to persuade District Judge James Robertson to delay his trial.
The Justice Department, having succeeded in keeping the Hamdan trial on track, repeated in its response to bin al-Shibh’s plea for an injunction with many of the same arguments it used against Hamdan’s request.
One of the man-eating tigers,
Bookmarks