Clipmarks | Unfair-prosecution Clips

Guantanamo is driving detainees crazy

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 13:08:13 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Next month, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who was once a driver for Osama bin Laden, could become the first detainee to be tried for war crimes in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. By now, he should be busily working on his defense.

But his lawyers say he cannot. They say Mr. Hamdan has essentially been driven crazy by solitary confinement in an 8-foot-by-12-foot cell where he spends at least 22 hours a day, goes to the bathroom and eats all his meals. His defense team says he is suicidal, hears voices, has flashbacks, talks to himself and says the restrictions of Guantánamo “boil his mind.”

“He will shout at us,” said his military defense lawyer, Lt. Cmdr. Brian L. Mizer. “He will bang his fists on the table.”

His lawyers have asked a military judge to stop his case until Mr. Hamdan is placed in less restrictive conditions at Guantánamo, saying he cannot get a fair trial if he cannot focus on defending himself.

Tags: guantanamo, detention, detainees, human-rights, unfair-prosecution

FBI threatens to sic Egyptian government on suspect's family

Thu, 25 Oct 2007 02:17:18 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: After 9/11, an Egyptian student in the US was picked up by the FBI, which mistakenly thought he owned an aviation transceiver found in a hotel room. When the FBI interrogated him, agents threatened to make sure Egyptian security "gives [his] family hell." Higazy confessed to owning the transceiver (but later an airline pilot admitted it was his).

This information was contained in a court decision letting Higazy's lawsuit against the FBI proceed. Subsequently, the court removed this decision from its website and replaced it with a redacted version...which removed the information about the FBI threats!

Unfortunately, the US news media (Washingon Post, New York Times) have failed to cover this aspect of the story.

Clip Source: www.cjr.org

Here’s where the story gets interesting—and newsworthy. When the ruling was posted on the court’s Web site at 10:30 a.m., as they typically are, it included a detailed description of how the FBI had coerced Higazy’s false confession. According to the ruling, Higazy says his interrogator threatened to “make sure that Egyptian security gives [his] family hell.” The agent later acknowledged that he very well knew that the Egyptians operated under what he called “different” laws, especially in relation to torture and civil rights. Higazy says he knew exactly what this meant—that if he didn’t “co-operate” his family back in Egypt would be in danger, from both their government and their neighbors.

But a couple of hours after the decision was posted, the court pulled the document.

Tags: fbi, unfair-prosecution, human-rights, civil-liberties, egypt, abdallah higazy, media

The American Ruling Class, 2007

Tue, 31 Jul 2007 21:27:02 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: Unfortunately, this really does sum it up.

Clip Source: www.youtube.com

ED-209

[Video]

Tags: film, bush administration, iraq, war, incompetence, civilian-killings, unfair-prosecution

Judge: DoJ tolerates prosecutorial misconduct

Wed, 04 Jul 2007 01:11:52 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.talkleft.com

The chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Boston, Mark Wolf, wrote to Alberto Gonzales (for all the good it will do) complaining that the Justice Department's private reprimand of AUSA Jeffrey Auerhahn was an unduly lenient response to Auerhahn's decision to withhold exculpatory evidence from the defense. That misconduct, in the words of Judge Wolf, “required the release from prison of a capo in the Patriarca family of La Cosa Nostra.”

Oddly, although the Justice Department's internal Office of Professional Responsibility concluded in 2005 that the evidence was exculpatory and that Auerhahn had a duty to disclose it, the Department argued in a 2006 brief that the evidence wasn't material and that disclosure wasn't required. The author of that brief apparently didn't receive the OPR memo.

“It is disturbing,” Judge Wolf wrote, “that the Department of Justice continued to advocate positions which O.P.R. had flatly rejected.”

Tags: justice-dept, alberto gonzales, unfair-prosecution, criminal-justice

Feb 2006 Report on Guantanamo Detainees

Sat, 16 Jun 2007 01:42:03 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: papers.ssrn.com

Among the findings of the Report:

1. Fifty-five percent (55%) of the detainees are not determined to have committed any hostile acts against the United States or its coalition allies.

2. Only 8% of the detainees were characterized as al Qaeda fighters. Of the remaining detainees, 40% have no definitive connection with al Qaeda at all and 18% are have no definitive affiliation with either al Qaeda or the Taliban.

3. The Government has detained numerous persons based on mere affiliations with a large number of groups that, in fact, are not on the Department of Homeland Security terrorist watchlist.

4. Only 5% of the detainees were captured by United States forces. 86% of the detainees were arrested by either Pakistan or the Northern Alliance and turned over to United States custody. This 86% of the detainees captured by Pakistan or the Northern Alliance were handed over to the United States at a time in which the United States offered large bounties for capture of suspected enemies.

Tags: guantanamo, detention, war-on-terror, pakistan, unfair-prosecution

Duke Lacrosse Pop Quiz

Mon, 16 Apr 2007 23:09:07 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: Via Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns, and Money

Clip Source: www.theagitator.com

How many of you know anything about the name "James Giles?"

Answer, then click "more."

Giles is a Texas man who served 10 years in prison, as well as an additional 14 years on probation and as a registered sex offender, for a rape committed in 1982.

Last week--the same week the Duke lacrosse team was exonerated--Giles too was exonerated, thanks to DNA evidence.

I'm guessing not many of you have heard of Giles. And I'm guessing just about all of you have heard of Reade Seligmann, David Evans, and Collin Finnerty.

This isn't to diminish what happened to the Duke players. It's to demonstrate the selective outrage on display from some of their defenders. The Duke guys didn't do a day of hard time. Giles did 10 years. The Duke guys were wrongfully labeled rapists for a little more than a year. Giles, for 24 years.

Google News count for "Duke lacrosse:" 4,168.

Google News count for "James Giles:" 418.

I'm just sayin'.

Tags: duke, lacrosse, unfair-prosecution, race

Marine refuses to prosecute terror suspect because of torture

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 20:52:48 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: Via: Mark Kleiman

Clip Source: pierretristam.com

When the Pentagon needed someone to prosecute a Guantanamo Bay prisoner linked to 9/11, it turned to Lt. Col. V. Stuart Couch.

The prisoner in question, Mohamedou Ould Slahi, had already been suspected of terrorist activity. After the attacks, he was fingered by a senior al Qaeda operative for helping assemble the so-called Hamburg cell, which included the hijacker who piloted United 175 into the South Tower. To Col. Couch, Mr. Slahi seemed a likely candidate for the death penalty.

"Of the cases I had seen, he was the one with the most blood on his hands," Col. Couch says.

But, nine months later, in what he calls the toughest decision of his military career, Col. Couch refused to proceed with the Slahi prosecution. The reason: He concluded that Mr. Slahi's incriminating statements -- the core of the government's case -- had been taken through torture, rendering them inadmissible under U.S. and international law.

Tags: marines, stuart couch, mohamedou ould slahi, war-on-terror, detention, unfair-prosecution, guantanamo, torture, human-rights, via:mark kleiman

WI US Attorney raises eyebrows

Fri, 06 Apr 2007 19:15:41 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.tpmmuckraker.com

A Bush-nominated U.S. Attorney launches a corruption case during an election year that implicates the Democratic governor. He pushes the case, which targets an obscure state bureaucrat and obtains a conviction in June; she's sentenced to 18 months in prison in late September. The case is featured prominently by Republicans in attack ads against the governor.
But when the case is appealed (after the election), the circuit court, in a remarkable reversal, rejects the conviction out of hand, saying that the evidence against the bureaucrat "is beyond thin." Says one of the three circuit judges, "I'm not sure what your actual theory in this case is."

Well, it happened -- in Wisconsin. And the U.S. attorney in the case is Milwaukee's Steven Biskupic, appointed by Bush in 2002. Somehow he's been given the privilege of serving beyond his four year term.

Dozens of readers have written in, asking if this is what a "loyal Bushie" looks like. It's hard to see it otherwise.

Tags: wisconsin, us attorney scandal, steven biskupic, justice-dept, democracy, unfair-prosecution

Federal prosecutors targetting Democrats?

Fri, 09 Mar 2007 19:30:46 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.warandpiece.com

The bigger scandal, however, almost surely involves prosecutors still in office. The Gonzales Eight were fired because they wouldn’t go along with the Bush administration’s politicization of justice. But statistical evidence suggests that many other prosecutors decided to protect their jobs or further their careers by doing what the administration wanted them to do: harass Democrats while turning a blind eye to Republican malfeasance.

Donald Shields and John Cragan, two professors of communication, have compiled a database of investigations and/or indictments of candidates and elected officials by U.S. attorneys since the Bush administration came to power. Of the 375 cases they identified, 10 involved independents, 67 involved Republicans, and 298 involved Democrats. The main source of this partisan tilt was a huge disparity in investigations of local politicians, in which Democrats were seven times as likely as Republicans to face Justice Department scrutiny.

Tags: bush administration, bush, alberto gonzales, gonzales, justice-dept, corruption, politics, news, unfair-prosecution

Guantanamo Unclassified

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 23:39:12 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: YouTube video about Adel Hamad, a Sudanese aid worker who lived in Afghanistan and Pakistan, who was arrested in 2002 and sent to Guantanamo in 2003.

Even one of the US Army officers who sat on his tribunal said the evidence against him was weak and called his detention "unconscionable".

Because Congress nullified the writ of habeas corpus, Hamad has no recourse to prove his innocence. Hence this Youtube video made by his lawyers.

Find out more at: www.projecthamad.org

Clip Source: www.youtube.com

Guantanamo Unclassified

Clip Source: www.projecthamad.org

Tags: guantanamo, unfair-prosecution, adel hamad, bush administration, detention

Connecticut Teacher Facing Jail for Porno Popups

Sat, 27 Jan 2007 21:16:17 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: A malware ridden computer starts to display pornographic popups when the students surfed the web, and the substitute teacher in charge has been tried and convicted of multiple counts of felonies.

Clip Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

Lindsay Beyerstein

Bio

Connecticut Teacher Facing Jail for Porno Popups (38 comments )

A substitute teacher from Connecticut is facing up to 40 years in prison because her malware-riddled computer displayed porno popups in class.

On October 19, 2004, Julie Amero arrived at Kelly Middle School to teach a 7th grade language arts class. Mr. Matthew Nett, the class's regular teacher, logged Amero into the classroom computer and left, warning

Amero let the students surf the web for a few minutes. The kids visited several innocuous sites including an innocent-looking page on hair styles. Suddenly, pornographic popups started to fill the screen. Soon, the machine was frozen in an endless porn loop.

Nobody in that classroom clicked on any porn that day. The popups were generated automatically by a piece of malicious code from the hair site. Readers with a technical bent can learn exactly how the malware hijacked Amero's computer from defense expert Herb Horner and security consultant Alex Eckelberry.

A few weeks later, Amero was arrested and charge with multiple felonies.

The defense's expert witness performed an independent forensic analysis of the computer and found that it was infected with multiple pieces of malicious code, including the script from the hairdressing site that spawned all those popups.

On January 5, 2007 a Norwich jury found her guilty on four counts of "injury or risk of injury to, or impairing morals of, children." Each count carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison. It seems unlikely that Amero will get the maximum sentence, jail remains a very real possibility. Felony convictions could also end Amero's career as a teacher. She will be sentenced on March 2.

If Julie Amero's conviction is not overturned, an innocent woman will have been framed by a computer.

Tags: porn, connecticut, unfair-prosecution, julie amero

Former US Detainee in Iraq Recalls Torment

Wed, 20 Dec 2006 17:21:29 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks: Please direct any comments to debbyski's clip, since she beat me to clipping this.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

December 18, 2006

Former U.S. Detainee in Iraq Recalls Torment

By MICHAEL MOSS

Detainee 200343 was among thousands of people who have been held and released by the American military in Iraq, and his account of his ordeal has provided one of the few detailed views of the Pentagon’s detention operations since the abuse scandals at Abu Ghraib. Yet in many respects his case is unusual.

The detainee was Donald Vance, a 29-year-old Navy veteran from Chicago who went to Iraq as a security contractor. He wound up as a whistle-blower, passing information to the F.B.I. about suspicious activities at the Iraqi security firm where he worked, including what he said was possible illegal weapons trading.

But when American soldiers raided the company at his urging, Mr. Vance and another American who worked there were detained as suspects by the military, which was unaware that Mr. Vance was an informer, according to officials and military documents.

The story told through those records and interviews illuminates the haphazard system of detention and prosecution that has evolved in Iraq, where detainees are often held for long periods without charges or legal representation, and where the authorities struggle to sort through the endless stream of detainees to identify those who pose real threats.

Tags: donald vance, nathan ertel, iraq, detention, unfair-prosecution, bush administration, war, politics, news

The torment of Jose Padilla

Mon, 04 Dec 2006 18:32:50 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.talkleft.com

His lawyers argue, and a psychiatrist who evaluated Padilla agrees, he is not competent to stand trial.

They argue that he has been so damaged by his interrogations and prolonged isolation that he suffers post-traumatic stress disorder and is unable to assist in his own defense. His interrogations, they say, included hooding, stress positions, assaults, threats of imminent execution and the administration of “truth serums.”

“It is my opinion that as the result of his experiences during his detention and interrogation, Mr. Padilla does not appreciate the nature and consequences of the proceedings against him, is unable to render assistance to counsel, and has impairments in reasoning as the result of a mental illness, i.e., post-traumatic stress disorder, complicated by the neuropsychiatric effects of prolonged isolation,” Dr. Hegarty said in an affidavit for the defense.

Even military lawyers agree:

Philip D. Cave, a former judge advocate general for the Navy and now a lawyer specializing in military law, said, “There’s nothing comparable in terms of severity of confinement, in terms of how Padilla was held, especially considering that this was pretrial confinement.”

Tags: jose padilla, detention, unfair-prosecution, human-rights, law, legal, crime, news, politics

US jails, tortures Taliban victim

Sun, 22 Oct 2006 10:44:24 GMT

clipped by: jklugman
clipper's remarks:

Other detainees whose lawyers filed new evidence in U.S. District Court motions this month include:

Adel Hassan Hamad, a Sudanese charity worker arrested at 1:30 a.m. July 18, 2002, in his Peshawar, Pakistan, apartment. Co-workers swear he was a hospital administrator with no connection to terrorists. A dissenting U.S. Army major on the panel that reviewed the unclassified and secret evidence against him called it "unconscionable" to detain him because some employees of the same charity may have supported terrorist ideals.

Nazar "Chaman" Gul, a 29-year-old Afghani who thought he was working as an armed fuel depot guard for the Karzi government installed by U.S. forces. The man who hired him swears that was the case, but he is accused of being a member of a terrorist group. The lawyers say he has been mistaken for a commander of that terror group, named Chaman Gul, also held at Guantanamo.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

U.S. Jails Man Once Tortured by Taliban

Enemy of the State: Kurdish Man Who Was Imprisoned by Taliban Detained for Years by U.S.

By MICHAEL J. SNIFFEN Associated Press Writer

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Abdul Rahim insists he's an apolitical student who fled a strict father. But he's fallen into a black hole in the war on terror in which first the Taliban and then the United States imprisoned him as an enemy of the state.

Arrested by the Taliban in Afghanistan in January 2000, Rahim says al-Qaida leaders burned him with cigarettes, smashed his right hand, deprived him of sleep, nearly drowned him and hanged him from the ceiling until he "confessed" to spying for the United States.

U.S. forces took the young Kurd from Syria into custody in January 2002 after the Taliban fled his prison. Accusing him of being an al-Qaida terrorist, U.S. interrogators deprived him of sleep, threatened him with police dogs and kept him in stress positions for hours, he says. He's been held ever since as an enemy combatant.

Rahim's story is one of several emerging from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay as defense lawyers make bids to free their clients while the Bush administration tries to use a new law to lock them out of federal courts.

After the Supreme Court overturned President Bush's plans for commissions to try detainees, Bush obtained a new law from Congress barring federal courts from hearing appeals for release by any alien "properly detained as an enemy combatant." The Justice Department told district and appellate judges this week they no longer have jurisdiction to hear dozens of such pending cases.

Calling the move to strip jurisdiction "a direct attack on our constitutional structure," Federal Public Defender Steven T. Wax in Portland, Ore., said, "We will litigate that as hard as we can in whatever forum we can find, because they are wrong."

Tags: bush administration, torture, human-rights, unfair-prosecution, detention, guantanamo

Shin Bet denies vital treatment to Palestinians

Sun, 15 Oct 2006 19:43:33 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.haaretz.com

Rights group: Shin Bet denies vital treatment to Palestinians

_{By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent}

The Shin Bet security service is systematically preventing Palestinians who need medical treatment unavailable in the territories from entering Israel, a new report by the nonprofit organization Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) charges.

According to the organization, in many cases, patients have been denied urgent, life-saving treatment.

The report says that the Shin Bet automatically refuses entry permits, and reconsiders its decisions only if legal action is begun.

In response, the Shin Bet said that it has to balance security considerations against human rights, and noted that terrorist groups have tried to take advantage of Palestinian patients with entry permits in order to carry out attacks inside Israel.

The report, a copy of which was given to Haaretz, claims that the Shin Bet has veto power over all requests by Palestinian patients seeking to enter Israel for medical purposes or to travel from the territories abroad. Many of the requests are turned down on the grounds that the individual is "forbidden entry." That is a classification for Palestinians whom the Shin Bet considers potential threats to national security.

However, it is rare for someone to be tagged as "forbidden entry" because of specific information about that individual. In most cases, the label is based on general profiles of potential terrorists.

The organization decribes the use of these profiles as collective punishment, and emphasizes that denying medical treatment to Palestinian patients violates their human rights. For some patients, no medical treatment is tantamount to a death sentence.

Tags: occupation, israel, palestine, suffering, shin bet, unfair-prosecution