SCOTUS Grants Guantanamo Prisoners Habeas Corpus

[dar512]

Article here.

Personally, I think this will be a good thing in the long run.

[BigV]

I agree. A victory for the rule of law is a good thing.

If the bad guy's goal is to destroy our way of life, dismantling/ignoring/disrespecting our legal system is doing their work *for them*, right?

[DanaC]

If they're a bad guy, then there should be evidence to prove it. If there isn't evidence to prove it then you can't say they're a bad guy. If you can prove it then you have no reason not to allow them a proper defence. If by allowing them a proper defence the evidence fails.....then so be it.

[Radar]

Originally Posted by DanaC

If they're a bad guy, then there should be evidence to prove it. If there isn't evidence to prove it then you can't say they're a bad guy. If you can prove it then you have no reason not to allow them a proper defence. If by allowing them a proper defence the evidence fails.....then so be it.

Mark today on your calendar. DanaC and I agree on something. I agree with everything she said other than the spelling of the word "defense". These people should be taken to an American court and given access to American defense lawyers, and get all of the same due process as anyone born in America.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Radar

These people should be taken to an American court and given access to American defense lawyers, and get all of the same due process as anyone born in America.

This is a third time that a Supreme Court has ruled against this administration on Guantanamo - and almost nothing changed.

Well something like 450 of the 800 prisoners in Guantanamo were released as innocent after being imprisoned without judicial review for many years. Question remains how many are guilty. Typical numbers are 14 of 800 were guilty. How will the White House again subvert a Supreme Court ruling?

[tw]

Originally Posted by DanaC

If they're a bad guy, then there should be evidence to prove it. If there isn't evidence to prove it then you can't say they're a bad guy. If you can prove it then you have no reason not to allow them a proper defence. If by allowing them a proper defence the evidence fails.....then so be it.

Hundreds were held in Guantanamo while innocent and without due process because wacko extremists needed bogeymen to lie and remain popular. Hundreds have already been released to their home nations because, after being tortured and held for years in violation of laws, suddenly they are guilty of nothing.

Today another five have had charges dropped because (from the NY Times of 21 Oct 2008)

U.S. Drops Charges for 5 Guantánamo Detainees
All five of the cases had been handled by a prosecutor who stepped down in September, saying there were systemic problems with the fairness of the military prosecutions there. ...

The dismissal was a retreat by the government facing an aggressive defense in the case.

It came in the same week that administration lawyers changed course in another highly publicized terrorism case, abandoning efforts to prove that six other Guantánamo detainees took part in a 2001 plan to bomb the United States Embassy in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Long time Cellar dwellers can confirm, I have never been so critical of any politician ... ever. But we never had a president so obviously corrupt. We have never had a president who lies so much. We have never had a president so stupid as to almost get us in a hot war with China over a silly spy plane. Who was calling that ignorant back when George Jr almost got us into war?

We are now starting to suffer the economic consequences of a mental midget president supported by people who must be told how to think daily by Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, and Pat Robertson. (Europeans just cannot appreciate how widespread the propaganda that tells Urbane Guerrilla types what to know. Europeans were lesser people who could even be kidnapped at any time if the US felt threatened.)

Guantanamo is the perfect example of what anti-patriots have done to America.

Five more completely innocent people released because America has too many who are so wacko extremist.

The best known of the five men whose charges were dismissed Tuesday is Binyam Mohamed, ... accused in the “dirty bomb” case. He has claimed he was tortured while in American custody or in countries to which he said the United States sent him. His lawyers argued Tuesday that the government was trying to avoid having to answer his accusations.

How many were patriotic enough to see Saddam did not have WMDs? No other politician has ever earned or received from me so much criticism - including their routine use of torture. Why are Americans so sheepish as to not demand the impeachment of this nation's worst president ever? Because to many Americans even still approve of torture ... and who also call for the murder of Obama. I have even heard it discussed in low voices. Wacko extremism in its many condoned forms (hate, racism, demagoguery) is alive and well and far more embedded in America that most Europeans would realize.

We held and tortured some 800 innocent people for years. And then say, “Sorry about that.” When do we Get Smart?

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by tw

after being tortured

cite.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

cite.

First, define torture. This administration has had a more difficult time defining torture than Bill Clinton did defining 'sex'. It would be humorous if the stakes weren't so high. A simple definition of 'torture' is 'treatment you would not want inflicted on your soldiers if they were captured'.

By this definition, stress positions, sleep deprivation, fake executions, and waterboarding are all 'torture'.

In 2004, the Justice Department attempted to set as the legal policy of the US an incredibly narrow definition of torture.

In the view expressed by the Justice Department memo, which differs from the view of the Army, physical torture "must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death." For a cruel or inhuman psychological technique to rise to the level of mental torture, the Justice Department argued, the psychological harm must last "months or even years."

Of course the Justice Department, unlike the Army, had the luxury of knowing that their personnel would never be in a situation where that definition could be used against them.

Since it's inception, the US has maintained the legal fiction that the detention facility at Guantanamo is some legal Limbo. The laws of the US do not apply, because it is in Cuba but is not an embassy. The laws of Cuba do not apply, because it is under US control via the disputed Cuban-American Treaty of 1903. So the US has basically created a legal space in the cracks between the laws of two sovereign nations and dropped the detainees into it.

The Supreme Court at first went along with this to a degree, sort of like the lifeguards at a pool allowing a certain amount of roughhousing in the water. At some point, matters became so severe that the court intervened to apply some legal boundary before the water got bloody.

While nowhere near as brutal as the "Hanoi Hilton", there is not a lot of doubt that even "Class B" torture like sleep deprivation over a period of years would render any confession inadmissible in a normal American court, or even a military court trying members of its own service.

The challenge is that even if any of these defendants are found guilty, the moment that they are shipped back to their own countries or the United States for imprisonment, they will reenter the normal world and be able to appeal their convictions. Fortunately for the US, some of these countries are not democratic but are allies of the US, so they might be safely transported to another legal black hole which will prevent their physical and legal treatment from being examined in detail.

[TheMercenary]

I can't agree more. Lets just bag the trials and send them all to their home countries immediately, whether they want to go there or not, and close the place. Burn it down.

[TheMercenary]

Yea, setting the first precident for illegals. But hey, now that the system is working in your favor you want to take advantage of it. What happened to the reams of discussion how the SCOTUS should not exist? But they have spoken. I support them in their decision making process.

[deadbeater]

Now this is something the Supreme Court has done right, alluding to a title on a thread on this board! If they ruled otherwise, Americans abroad, and every diplomat, is fair game for any despot, anybody who has a grudge. And the US couldn't do squat.

[flaja]

Originally Posted by deadbeater

Now this is something the Supreme Court has done right, alluding to a title on a thread on this board! If they ruled otherwise, Americans abroad, and every diplomat, is fair game for any despot, anybody who has a grudge. And the US couldn't do squat.

Diplomats have diplomatic immunity because of treaty agreements. The most any foreign government can do to diplomats is expel them from the foreign government’s country.

Since Congress has not declared war on any country, I don’t know of any treaty that would be applicable to the inmates at Gitmo. But since Congress has the constitutional power to define and punish offenses against the law of nations and to make laws governing capture on both land and sea, anyone whom we have captured in Iraq or Afghanistan would be under the jurisdiction of U.S. courts (if we were legally at war, then the Geneva Convention would kick in but I don’t know if POWs would have automatic access to U.S. civil courts- we have tried enemy espionage agents in civil courts during times of war).

Furthermore, there is something inherently dangerous about any government that takes it upon itself to lock-up someone indefinitely without charge or trial. The rightwing media pundits that are hinting that the President/military should ignore the court and continue to keep people jailed at Gitmo are little different than the SS and Gestapo that routinely took criminal defendants into “protective custody” after they had been acquitted by German courts.

[tw]

Originally Posted by flaja

Since Congress has not declared war on any country, I don’t know of any treaty that would be applicable to the inmates at Gitmo.

An additional point. George Jr attempted to suspend the constitutionally guaranteed right of Habeas Corpus. That right can be suspended only during war. George Jr's presidential signings (that we know about) have essentially declared America at war. This Supreme Court ruling says the writ of Habeas Corpus has not been suspended - implying that America is not at war.

Interesting question remains: what will the administration do this time to subvert the court's ruling.

This court ruling has suspended the July trial of Hamdan. This court ruling comes with cheers from virtually the entire Military Judge Advocate corp who have been appalled at the perversion of American laws, military justice, massive violations of basic human rights, and routine use of torture.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by tw

and routine use of torture.

Supporting facts please for "routine".

[flaja]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Supporting facts please for "routine".

Does this means that you support occasional torture?

Any act of torture on the part of the U.S. or on behalf of the U.S. is deplorable.