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Habeas Corpus – We can withhold it…but should we?
“>Judge upholds detainee rights terror law
A federal judge upheld the Bush administration’s new terrorism law Wednesday, agreeing that Guantanamo Bay detainees do not have the right to challenge their imprisonment in U.S. courts.
Just because we can withhold their day in court, I don’t think we should. It seems to me that we have more to gain by demonstrating to the world our respect for justice than persecuting these folks just because we can. If the problem is that tactical secrets might be compromised by presenting our government’s case then I would prefer we make the effort to find a compromise.
I’d hate for us to miss the bigger picture of winning back the hearts and minds of our potential friends around the world.
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14 Responses to “Habeas Corpus – We can withhold it…but should we?”
That’s odd. The MCA specifically states that these individuals can appeal their status to the US District Court of Appeals, as well as later the Supreme Court.
The AP release is, of course, useless, and I can’t find the decision online yet. Oh well, something will beat it into shape sooner or later.
Dead link, btw. Need to get rid of the line break tag inside the hyperreference.
a man may be held by our government in a place where no law applies
Presumably, as we now consider this the rule of law, other countries also have the right to hold prisoners where ‘no law applies’ if their leader believes such prisoners are ‘enemy combatants’. What a blow to our military and diplomatic corps, or for that matter, perhaps any American with a camera.
The point is, what arguments will the US use when american citizens are arrested or hijacked and consequently totured and held in secret jail indefinetly, on the grounds that they are accused of being terrorists, anywhere on the world?
That’s the same thing you do to foreigners. You lost every moral standing to protest violations of human rights. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
“The MCA specifically states that these individuals can appeal their status to the US District Court of Appeals, as well as later the Supreme Court.”
Doesn’t this only apply to US citizen?
No… The MCA does not include United States Citizens in its jurisdiction, as a definitional thing it can not apply to them, nevermind only to them.
Moreover, the relevant text does not put any limitations on who the USDCoA can take appeals from.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/politics/4400771.html
Sorry about the dead link. I was using the one I got from CSPAN News.
Dec. 13, 2006, 7:55PM
Judge sides with Bush on detainees’ rights
Ruling contends the new law limits access to courts by prisoners at Gitmo
By MATT APUZZO
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — A federal judge upheld the Bush administration’s new terrorism law Wednesday, agreeing that Guantanamo Bay detainees do not have the right to challenge their imprisonment in U.S. courts.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge James Robertson is the first to address the new Military Commissions Act and is a legal victory for the Bush administration at a time when it has been fending off criticism of the law.
Robertson rejected a legal challenge by Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a former driver for Osama bin Laden whose case prompted the Supreme Court to strike down the administration’s policy on detainees.
Following Hamdan’s victory last year, Bush asked for and got a new law that established military commissions to try enemy combatants and stripped them of the right to seek their freedom in U.S. courts.
Hamdan’s case was sent back before Robertson, a nominee of President Clinton’s who was a prominent civil rights advocate in private practice.
Though Robertson originally sided with Hamdan, he said that he no longer had jurisdiction to hear Hamdan’s case because Congress clearly intended to keep such disputes out of federal courts. He said foreigners being held in overseas military prisons do not have the right to challenge their detention.
The ruling does not affect hundred of detainees whose cases are awaiting a ruling by a Washington appeals court, which is reviewing two cases challenging the new law.
The link’s fixable, it just has an html tag lumped on the end. Probably just the software you all use.
Reading the rulings by SCOTUS and Robertson will be far more enlightening than the news articles, especially editorials. Robertson apparently uses precedent for his decision that his court does not have the appropriate jurisdiction to grant Hamden habeas.
The facts speak for themselves. Thousands have been held today, over 3 years, many tortured, some killed, without recourse to the courts, access to lawyers, without even an admission of who has been imprisoned or why.
gattsuru, how would you like to be the one, disappeared on some trip abroad for pointing your camera at a ship in the harbor? No one would know what happened, and your captors would be quoting our Attorney General, President, and perhaps even you to justify their actions.
Yes, Greendreams, that’s really wonderful. You’ve truely persuaded me to drink the kool aid – I mean, it’s not like the law explictly provides them recourse to the courts as well as appeals inside the military review system, it’s not like these individuals are directly linked to (or just plain are) terrorists, and it’s not like they retain the right to subpeona witnesses or other vital information in front of the military tribunal.
Now I should go walk around DC unarmed because the Nanny State will protect me.
Many of the folks in prison may not be terrorists but merely in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Even in our legal system a significant number of people executed and on death row have been exonerated by DNA evidence.
I am personally willing to pull the switch on a proven killer of innocent women and children. But I feel personally diminished to know that my government is tormenting someone innocent.
Er, last I checked no one has been executed and later exonerated in the American legal system. We’ve gotten close, but never hit it as far as I can tell.
“last I checked no one has been executed and later exonerated in the American legal system.”
And why may that be so?
Officially, courts do not consider claims of innocence after a person has been executed.”
On the other hand:
“Northwestern University School of Law’s Centre on Wrongful Convictions (CWC) documented at least 38 executions carried out in the United States in spite of compelling evidence of innocence or serious doubt about guilt since capital punishment was restored in the mid-1970s. According to this study, while innocence has not been proven in any specific case, there is no reasonable doubt that some of the executed prisoners were innocent.”
(same source as above)