Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Newsweek
May 19, 2008 Periscope
By Dan Ephron
More than six years after it began imprisoning terrorist suspects at Guantánamo Bay, the Bush administration finally hopes to present evidence against one of them at trial next month and prove that its much-criticized military-commissions system can be fair. Yemeni national Salim Ahmed Hamdan, one of Gitmo's highest-profile detainees, faces charges of conspiracy and giving material support to terrorists while serving as Osama bin Laden's driver. But the commission's former lead prosecutor, Air Force Col. Morris Davis, now says the government weighed a plea agreement with Hamdan last year that would have halted a trial and presumably set a date for his release.
Davis told NEWSWEEK that Gen. Thomas Hartmann, the Pentagon's top legal adviser in the commission's office, made plans to fly to Gitmo last August with Neal Katyal, one of Hamdan's civilian defense attorneys, to hammer out a plea deal. Davis said the trip was postponed when he filed a complaint against Hartmann for interfering in prosecutorial decision making. Davis's complaint touched off a Pentagon investigation, and he resigned his post in October. "I think the turmoil just collapsed the whole plea bargain," Davis said. Hartmann refused to discuss the episode and Katyal said he "never comments publicly on the existence of plea negotiations."
Davis does not know what Hartmann was ready to offer Hamdan, who has repeatedly, and successfully, challenged aspects of the military-commissions process in court. The prosecution depicts Hamdan as a Qaeda terrorist—not just a $200-a-month chauffeur—whose alleged crimes merit life in prison. But a plea bargain the government agreed to months earlier with Australian detainee David Hicks would certainly have been viewed by Hamdan as a precedent. Hicks got nine months in exchange for a guilty plea to the charge of giving material support to terrorists. Prosecutors believe they have a stronger case against Hamdan. But a trial could prove embarrassing for the Bush administration if Hamdan describes being beaten during his interrogation. That is, if he even shows up in court: he promised earlier this month to boycott his own trial.
May 19, 2008 Periscope
By Dan Ephron
More than six years after it began imprisoning terrorist suspects at Guantánamo Bay, the Bush administration finally hopes to present evidence against one of them at trial next month and prove that its much-criticized military-commissions system can be fair. Yemeni national Salim Ahmed Hamdan, one of Gitmo's highest-profile detainees, faces charges of conspiracy and giving material support to terrorists while serving as Osama bin Laden's driver. But the commission's former lead prosecutor, Air Force Col. Morris Davis, now says the government weighed a plea agreement with Hamdan last year that would have halted a trial and presumably set a date for his release.
Davis told NEWSWEEK that Gen. Thomas Hartmann, the Pentagon's top legal adviser in the commission's office, made plans to fly to Gitmo last August with Neal Katyal, one of Hamdan's civilian defense attorneys, to hammer out a plea deal. Davis said the trip was postponed when he filed a complaint against Hartmann for interfering in prosecutorial decision making. Davis's complaint touched off a Pentagon investigation, and he resigned his post in October. "I think the turmoil just collapsed the whole plea bargain," Davis said. Hartmann refused to discuss the episode and Katyal said he "never comments publicly on the existence of plea negotiations."
Davis does not know what Hartmann was ready to offer Hamdan, who has repeatedly, and successfully, challenged aspects of the military-commissions process in court. The prosecution depicts Hamdan as a Qaeda terrorist—not just a $200-a-month chauffeur—whose alleged crimes merit life in prison. But a plea bargain the government agreed to months earlier with Australian detainee David Hicks would certainly have been viewed by Hamdan as a precedent. Hicks got nine months in exchange for a guilty plea to the charge of giving material support to terrorists. Prosecutors believe they have a stronger case against Hamdan. But a trial could prove embarrassing for the Bush administration if Hamdan describes being beaten during his interrogation. That is, if he even shows up in court: he promised earlier this month to boycott his own trial.