E
EconomicDemocracy Coop
Guest
"The 9/11 trials for the six Guantanamo prisoners charged by the
Pentagon last week with conspiracy to commit war crimes might have
been rigged from the start to rule out the possibility of any
acquittals, this according to the latest statements to The Nation
magazine from Colonel Morris Davis, THE FORMER CHIEF PROSECUTOR FOR
GUANTANAMO'S MILITARY COMMISSIONS. [how much more incriminating can
you get?]
"let me first say something about Colonel Davis. He is a very highly
respected figure within the JAG court. I think a number of people saw
him as someone who was likely to emerge perhaps ultimately as the
Judge Advocate General of the Air Force, certainly one of the handful
of candidates likely to move forward. And he's hardly some civil
libertarian. In fact, his attitudes are extremely conservative. He's a
prosecutor. The friction he had previously with the Pentagon was
essentially over the fact that he was chomping at the bit, ready to go
forward with these prosecutions."
Then Colonel Davis found out the pro-torture memo supervisor -- Jim
Haynes -- put above him had a plain position: "we cannot have any
acquittals" Hayes as the general counsel of the Department of Defense,
he's the person who stands near the apex of this process. The
prosecutors report to him. The defense counsel report to him. The
judges report to him. The convening authority reports to him. He
stands over this entire process. And he already has an established
track record of intervening in these cases for political purposes, for
political manipulation.
As we've said for years now, the Bush Admin would rather sent
innocents to jail or even Death Sentence, than "lose face" by
admitting that MANY of the Guantanamo inmates not only have been
abused and mistreated, but are innocent and got where they are due to
some grudge or "hey, I can make money or cover my b tt by going to the
US military and saying this fellow's a terrorist" which Washington was
all too willing to believe any such hearsay, it made 'em look tough on
terror to "find" suspects by the bushel to throw into Guantanamo...too
embarrassing to admit they played Americans for fools by throwing into
Gitmo tons of people many, many of whom were innocent, so they'd
rather jail and even execute these folks with rigged trials. And
torture forced "confessions" And hearsay...but now, finally admitted,
just plain making sure that "We can't have any acquittals" is the
name of the game. Below:
EXCLUSIVE: Rigged Trials at Guantanamo
The Nation magazine reveals the former chief prosecutor for the
prison's military commissions says the Pentagon has foreclosed the
possibility of acquittals. We speak with Nation reporter Ross Tuttle
and law professor Scott Horton. [includes rush transcript]
= = =
Guests:
Ross Tuttle, Documentary filmmaker and journalist who wrote the story
'Gitmo Trials Rigged.'
Scott Horton, international law expert and Harper's magazine legal
affairs contributor. He writes the blog No Comment
= = =
AMY GOODMAN: The 9/11 trials for the six Guantanamo prisoners charged
by the Pentagon last week with conspiracy to commit war crimes might
have been rigged from the start to rule out the possibility of any
acquittals, this according to the latest statements to The Nation
magazine from Colonel Morris Davis, the former chief prosecutor for
Guantanamo's military commissions.
Colonel Davis recounted a 2005 meeting with the Bush administration-
appointed Pentagon General Counsel William Haynes, who now oversees
the prosecutions and the defense for the tribunal process. Haynes
said, "We can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these guys for
so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't have
acquittals, we've got to have convictions."
Colonel Davis resigned from the military commissions in October 2007,
saying the system had become "politicized" and he could no longer be
effective. His latest statements to The Nation magazine offer the most
pointed evidence of the military commission's bias and undermine the
Bush administration's claims of ensuring fair trials for the accused.
The article is up on The Nation magazine's website at thenation.com
and is called "Gitmo Trials Rigged." Documentary filmmaker and
journalist Ross Tuttle broke the story, joining us now from Los
Angeles, California for this Democracy Now! exclusive. We're also
joined here in our firehouse studio by international law expert and
Harper's magazine legal affairs contributor Scott Horton.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Ross Tuttle, let's begin with
you. Start from the beginning. What exactly did you learn?
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, I was researching a story, actually, on just a
detainee who had been in Guantanamo, or has been in Guantanamo for
quite some time. I decided to call the former prosecutor. He had been
quite vocal about his opinions since resigning. Before, he had been a
staunch advocate of the commissions, spoke at length, actually, in
another op-ed, before he resigned, in June lauding the commissions.
Then he resigned in October. And I thought I'd give him a call just to
see what he'd say about the recent events with the charges in February
that were announced and to get his opinion about whether there could
be some fair trials. And that's when he told me about this
conversation that he had.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain exactly who he is and the conversation that he
had.
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, Colonel Morris Davis is a former prosecutor for the
military commissions overseeing all the prosecutions, essentially. And
he told me, basically--when I asked him, I said, "Will these men get a
fair trial?" He said, "Well, when I had a conversation with William
Haynes," who was--or who is the general counsel for the Department of
Defense, who's essentially the chief legal officer at the Department
of Defense--he said, "When we discussed the Nuremberg trials"--and
that's when Morris said, "Well, Nuremberg trials, you know, there were
some acquittals at the Nuremberg trials, and if indeed there are some
acquittals in our situation here, at least that will lend some
legitimacy to the process." And that's when he said Haynes looked at
him, eyes got wide, and said, "We can't have acquittals." He said,
"How can we explain holding these people for so long?" and "We have to
have convictions."
AMY GOODMAN: Explain exactly the position that Haynes occupies to make
this opinion so significant.
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, at the time--I mean, at the time, Haynes was an
adviser to the Secretary of Defense. Haynes's formal role in regard to
the commissions--I'm not exactly sure what it was. But what Davis told
me is that he resigned the moment that, or a few hours after, Haynes
was inserted above him in the chain of command for the commissions.
Basically, Haynes will--at the time, when the defense and the
prosecution both report to deputies within the Department of Defense,
who then both report to William Haynes, as it stands now.
So once Haynes was inserted above him, Davis had a couple of concerns.
Haynes has also been linked to some memos that have been dubbed "the
torture memos," or one in particular that was released in November
2002. It was a report that he wrote for Donald Rumsfeld, and it was
advocating the use of aggressive interrogation techniques. And so, I
think Davis said he was also concerned about that, about the fact that
this individual who he didn't see eye-to-eye with, as far as coerced
testimony and evidence that was obtained through coercion--that was one
problem for Davis. And the other was this bias.
AMY GOODMAN: Scott Horton, talk about what Colonel Davis said and
about Haynes's significance.
SCOTT HORTON: Well, let me first say something about Colonel Davis. He
is a very highly respected figure within the JAG court. I think a
number of people saw him as someone who was likely to emerge perhaps
ultimately as the Judge Advocate General of the Air Force, certainly
one of the handful of candidates likely to move forward. And he's
hardly some civil libertarian. In fact, his attitudes are extremely
conservative. He's a prosecutor. The friction he had previously with
the Pentagon was essentially over the fact that he was chomping at the
bit, ready to go forward with these prosecutions.
Now, I think this--the news that Ross has broken here is absolutely
devastating to the Guantanamo military commissions process, because
they have been trotted out by General Hartmann, if you looked at his
interviews the last few days, as an effort to replicate Nuremberg and
the Nuremberg proceedings. And remember, Justice Robert Jackson, who
was responsible for organizing them, said very clearly, repeatedly,
it's important not only that justice be done here, but that these
proceedings appear to be just. In fact, the appearance of justice was
more important even than the underlying result in the proceedings.
AMY GOODMAN: In fact, there were some people in Nuremberg who were
acquitted.
SCOTT HORTON: Three in the opening proceeding alone. There were quite
a few people who were acquitted. And I think there was a broad
perception around the world that those proceedings were fair, that the
defendants had a full opportunity to defend themselves. And the US
accomplished its principal objective in those proceedings, which was
demonstrating to the world, but particularly to the audience at home
and Germany and then later with the Pacific tribunals in Japan, the
evil that had been done by these people who were put on trial. So it
was effective because it was just and fair.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, this statement, exactly what Davis said Haynes said--
Davis said, "at which point, [Haynes's] eyes got wide and he said,
'Wait a minute, we can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these
guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't
have acquittals, we've got to have convictions.'"
SCOTT HORTON: A devastating statement. It destroys the reputation for
fairness of these proceedings. You have to remember that Jim Haynes is
not just anybody. As the general counsel of the Department of Defense,
he's the person who stands near the apex of this process.
AMY GOODMAN: He's not the prosecutor.
SCOTT HORTON: He's not the prosecutor. The prosecutors report to him.
The defense counsel report to him. The judges report to him. The
convening authority reports to him. He stands over this entire
process. And he already has an established track record of intervening
in these cases for political purposes, for political manipulation. The
Wall Street Journal broke that story the third week of September when
they showed how he had intervened to mastermind the plea bargain in
the Hicks case, in which the prosecutors were excluded. Haynes was
involved doing this, and he was involved doing it basically to make
good on pledges that Vice President Cheney had made to the Australian
prime minister, to help out his friend in Australia in connection with
an election. So that already set the tone here.
AMY GOODMAN: David Hicks was an Australian prisoner at Guantanamo--
SCOTT HORTON: Exactly right.
AMY GOODMAN: --who was ultimately sent back to Australia.
SCOTT HORTON: And is now free. He was sent back. He was given the
minimum possible sentence that would allow his repatriation, his
return to Australia.
AMY GOODMAN: Ross Tuttle, response to this explosive piece, "Gitmo
Trials Rigged," to what Davis--what Colonel Davis is saying Haynes told
him?
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, I was--I mean, I guess--I don't know if I was that
surprised. I mean, I was surprised that somebody would say it or say
it for attribution or say it to somebody who then say it for
attribution, but, you know, in talking to a lot of people, I don't
know that that many people were surprised. You know, that sort of
registers with "Uh-huh," sort of "Yeah, I thought so."
But I feel like this is the first time, and why it struck me and why I
thought it was important to get out there, which was later confirmed
by a lot of the people that I spoke to when reporting, that this
really seems to be the first time that somebody at such a high level
has made such a statement that appears to be, you know, what a lot of
people have believed all along, that this process cannot result in
fair, open--you know, fair, open trials. And so, that's a concern.
And it, you know, hopefully--and I think what Davis is trying to do,
being out front on this issue, is trying to get people to recognize
that and get people to reevaluate the system and fix it, because I
think everybody--everybody involved--the detainees, the people in the
JAG Corps--I think, you know, most people involved, most people who pay
attention to this issue, they want to see justice done, but this
process seems deeply flawed.
AMY GOODMAN: Scott Horton, does conviction automatically mean death?
SCOTT HORTON: No, it doesn't automatically mean death. There's still a
discretionary process here. The United States--the prosecutors have
announced that they will seek the death penalty for at least some of
these detainees if they secure a conviction. But in our military
justice system, we haven't had an execution since 1961. Our system--our
military justice system very much--very strongly disfavors the death
penalty.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the role of the JAGs. Talk about the role of
the military lawyers and where they've stood over the years. Now, of
course, Davis has resigned.
SCOTT HORTON: Well, I think one thing we should stress up front is
that even the most severe critics of this process, for the most part,
stand in awe of the JAG Corps and the way they've handled things. I
mean, we've got a bunch of dedicated professionals who want to play
their jobs, want to play their roles competently and professionally.
And, in fact, professionalism has been the top note of the JAG Corps
since the beginning of this process.
And the concerns that are being articulated are about political
meddling with the work of the JAG Corps, intervention by political
appointees--and Haynes, I think, has been the most aggressive of them--
that stop the JAG officers from doing their proper roles and stop them
from functioning independently. And we've seen them stand up and
exercise independent judgment repeatedly. In fact, the first conflict
that they had with Haynes was over the torture memoranda. And that
memorandum that was described resulted in an order issued December
2nd, 2002 by Donald Rumsfeld that authorized torture techniques.
AMY GOODMAN: Have we ever seen this kind of standing up mass, standing
up before in--among military lawyers?
SCOTT HORTON: Absolutely unprecedented. In fact, I'd say, most
recently, when the Bush administration put forward the Military
Commissions Act, which the JAG lawyers didn't even get to see until
forty-eight hours before it was put forward on Congress, the Judge
Advocates General of the four service branches went to Capitol Hill
and testified against the legislation put forward by Gonzales and Jim
Haynes. That's never happened before in history.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to read a quote of Colonel Morris Davis. He
wrote a February 17th op-ed piece in the New York Times called
"Unforgivable Behavior, Inadmissible Evidence." He said, "Why a few
others in positions of power still find it so difficult to admit the
obvious about waterboarding is astounding. We can never retake the
moral high ground when we claim the right to do unto others that which
we would vehemently condemn if done to us. Once we condemn and stop
all waterboarding, what do we do in cases where it was conducted? An
obvious step is to prohibit the use of evidence derived by
waterboarding in criminal proceedings against detainees."
SCOTT HORTON: Well, he's stating essentially the prosecutor's dilemma.
You know, he was charged with prosecuting these cases. He knew that
waterboarding and other highly coercive techniques have been used on
the people he was prosecuting. He was presented with their confessions
to use as evidence. And he knew ethically and legally he couldn't do
that.
I think there's another very important thing that's latent in that
statement and was also charged very recently by Lieutenant Commander
Charlie Swift. He pointed to the fact that these proceedings are going
forward within a week of the time that we see official after official
of this administration, including President Bush and the head of the
Office of Legal Counsel and Attorney General Mukasey, coming forward
before Congress and other international fora to justify waterboarding.
Why are they doing that? They're doing that because they know that
this hangs in the background of these proceedings in Guantanamo, and
they want to press forward for the use of this coerced evidence, which
is really going to taint the proceedings and make a mockery of them
and embarrass the United States in the eyes of the world.
AMY GOODMAN: Ross Tuttle, you're also working on a piece on Benyam
Mohammed, another prisoner at Guantanamo.
ROSS TUTTLE: Correct. That's how I started on the story. It was a
documentary I had been working on for an ACLU documentary series that
covered rendition, extraordinary rendition, torture and habeas corpus.
Benyam Mohammed had, according to his own account, been a victim--well,
had fallen in all three of those categories. He has now been in
Guantanamo for about four years. Prior to that, according to a lengthy
diary that he transcribed to or that he told to his lawyer, Clive
Stafford Smith, he had spent eighteen months in a Moroccan prison as a
victim of extraordinary rendition, being grievously tortured. The
account that he provided to Smith then got out. It was declassified.
And it's really horrifying when you read it. And there are a lot of
details that corroborate the claims that he makes. A lot of people
have researched it, looked into it, and there are some--there is a lot
of corroborating evidence. But, I mean, if even a fraction of what he
says is true, it's really--I mean, it's a really horrific thing that
he's endured.
And so, I just felt like that his story needed to be told. I mean, I
felt like a lot of people who are still in Guantanamo, who are
languishing, who are awaiting trial, I mean, they just--you know,
according to their lawyers, I mean, they're just hoping--they just want
a fair trial. They just want something to be able to--you know, they
want to be able to face their accusers. And I felt like that was a
story that had been not necessarily forgotten, but it just had kind of
fallen out of the headlines. Not many people were paying that much
attention to it. It felt like in Europe a lot of people were really
focusing on this issue. And this story really disturbed me and was--
yeah, it was troubling. And that was the story that I initially sought
to tell when I contacted Davis.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Ross Tuttle, I want to thank you for joining us, LA-
based freelance documentary filmmaker and journalist. His piece is on
The Nation website at thenation.com. It's called "Gitmo Trials
Rigged." And Scott Horton, New York attorney specializing in
international law and human rights, legal affairs contributor to
Harper's magazine, where he writes the blog "No Comment."
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/2/20/guantanamo
= = = =
STILL FEELING LIKE THE MAINSTREAM U.S. CORPORATE MEDIA
IS GIVING A FULL HONEST PICTURE OF WHAT'S GOING ON?
= = = =
= = = =
Sorry, we cannot read/reply to most usenet posts but welcome email
FOR MORE INFORMATION: http://EconomicDemocracy.org/wtc/ (peace)
http://economicdemocracy.org/eco/climate-summary.html (Climate)
And http://EconomicDemocracy.org/ (general)
New email: econdemocracy[at]gmail[dot]com
Pentagon last week with conspiracy to commit war crimes might have
been rigged from the start to rule out the possibility of any
acquittals, this according to the latest statements to The Nation
magazine from Colonel Morris Davis, THE FORMER CHIEF PROSECUTOR FOR
GUANTANAMO'S MILITARY COMMISSIONS. [how much more incriminating can
you get?]
"let me first say something about Colonel Davis. He is a very highly
respected figure within the JAG court. I think a number of people saw
him as someone who was likely to emerge perhaps ultimately as the
Judge Advocate General of the Air Force, certainly one of the handful
of candidates likely to move forward. And he's hardly some civil
libertarian. In fact, his attitudes are extremely conservative. He's a
prosecutor. The friction he had previously with the Pentagon was
essentially over the fact that he was chomping at the bit, ready to go
forward with these prosecutions."
Then Colonel Davis found out the pro-torture memo supervisor -- Jim
Haynes -- put above him had a plain position: "we cannot have any
acquittals" Hayes as the general counsel of the Department of Defense,
he's the person who stands near the apex of this process. The
prosecutors report to him. The defense counsel report to him. The
judges report to him. The convening authority reports to him. He
stands over this entire process. And he already has an established
track record of intervening in these cases for political purposes, for
political manipulation.
As we've said for years now, the Bush Admin would rather sent
innocents to jail or even Death Sentence, than "lose face" by
admitting that MANY of the Guantanamo inmates not only have been
abused and mistreated, but are innocent and got where they are due to
some grudge or "hey, I can make money or cover my b tt by going to the
US military and saying this fellow's a terrorist" which Washington was
all too willing to believe any such hearsay, it made 'em look tough on
terror to "find" suspects by the bushel to throw into Guantanamo...too
embarrassing to admit they played Americans for fools by throwing into
Gitmo tons of people many, many of whom were innocent, so they'd
rather jail and even execute these folks with rigged trials. And
torture forced "confessions" And hearsay...but now, finally admitted,
just plain making sure that "We can't have any acquittals" is the
name of the game. Below:
EXCLUSIVE: Rigged Trials at Guantanamo
The Nation magazine reveals the former chief prosecutor for the
prison's military commissions says the Pentagon has foreclosed the
possibility of acquittals. We speak with Nation reporter Ross Tuttle
and law professor Scott Horton. [includes rush transcript]
= = =
Guests:
Ross Tuttle, Documentary filmmaker and journalist who wrote the story
'Gitmo Trials Rigged.'
Scott Horton, international law expert and Harper's magazine legal
affairs contributor. He writes the blog No Comment
= = =
AMY GOODMAN: The 9/11 trials for the six Guantanamo prisoners charged
by the Pentagon last week with conspiracy to commit war crimes might
have been rigged from the start to rule out the possibility of any
acquittals, this according to the latest statements to The Nation
magazine from Colonel Morris Davis, the former chief prosecutor for
Guantanamo's military commissions.
Colonel Davis recounted a 2005 meeting with the Bush administration-
appointed Pentagon General Counsel William Haynes, who now oversees
the prosecutions and the defense for the tribunal process. Haynes
said, "We can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these guys for
so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't have
acquittals, we've got to have convictions."
Colonel Davis resigned from the military commissions in October 2007,
saying the system had become "politicized" and he could no longer be
effective. His latest statements to The Nation magazine offer the most
pointed evidence of the military commission's bias and undermine the
Bush administration's claims of ensuring fair trials for the accused.
The article is up on The Nation magazine's website at thenation.com
and is called "Gitmo Trials Rigged." Documentary filmmaker and
journalist Ross Tuttle broke the story, joining us now from Los
Angeles, California for this Democracy Now! exclusive. We're also
joined here in our firehouse studio by international law expert and
Harper's magazine legal affairs contributor Scott Horton.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Ross Tuttle, let's begin with
you. Start from the beginning. What exactly did you learn?
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, I was researching a story, actually, on just a
detainee who had been in Guantanamo, or has been in Guantanamo for
quite some time. I decided to call the former prosecutor. He had been
quite vocal about his opinions since resigning. Before, he had been a
staunch advocate of the commissions, spoke at length, actually, in
another op-ed, before he resigned, in June lauding the commissions.
Then he resigned in October. And I thought I'd give him a call just to
see what he'd say about the recent events with the charges in February
that were announced and to get his opinion about whether there could
be some fair trials. And that's when he told me about this
conversation that he had.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain exactly who he is and the conversation that he
had.
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, Colonel Morris Davis is a former prosecutor for the
military commissions overseeing all the prosecutions, essentially. And
he told me, basically--when I asked him, I said, "Will these men get a
fair trial?" He said, "Well, when I had a conversation with William
Haynes," who was--or who is the general counsel for the Department of
Defense, who's essentially the chief legal officer at the Department
of Defense--he said, "When we discussed the Nuremberg trials"--and
that's when Morris said, "Well, Nuremberg trials, you know, there were
some acquittals at the Nuremberg trials, and if indeed there are some
acquittals in our situation here, at least that will lend some
legitimacy to the process." And that's when he said Haynes looked at
him, eyes got wide, and said, "We can't have acquittals." He said,
"How can we explain holding these people for so long?" and "We have to
have convictions."
AMY GOODMAN: Explain exactly the position that Haynes occupies to make
this opinion so significant.
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, at the time--I mean, at the time, Haynes was an
adviser to the Secretary of Defense. Haynes's formal role in regard to
the commissions--I'm not exactly sure what it was. But what Davis told
me is that he resigned the moment that, or a few hours after, Haynes
was inserted above him in the chain of command for the commissions.
Basically, Haynes will--at the time, when the defense and the
prosecution both report to deputies within the Department of Defense,
who then both report to William Haynes, as it stands now.
So once Haynes was inserted above him, Davis had a couple of concerns.
Haynes has also been linked to some memos that have been dubbed "the
torture memos," or one in particular that was released in November
2002. It was a report that he wrote for Donald Rumsfeld, and it was
advocating the use of aggressive interrogation techniques. And so, I
think Davis said he was also concerned about that, about the fact that
this individual who he didn't see eye-to-eye with, as far as coerced
testimony and evidence that was obtained through coercion--that was one
problem for Davis. And the other was this bias.
AMY GOODMAN: Scott Horton, talk about what Colonel Davis said and
about Haynes's significance.
SCOTT HORTON: Well, let me first say something about Colonel Davis. He
is a very highly respected figure within the JAG court. I think a
number of people saw him as someone who was likely to emerge perhaps
ultimately as the Judge Advocate General of the Air Force, certainly
one of the handful of candidates likely to move forward. And he's
hardly some civil libertarian. In fact, his attitudes are extremely
conservative. He's a prosecutor. The friction he had previously with
the Pentagon was essentially over the fact that he was chomping at the
bit, ready to go forward with these prosecutions.
Now, I think this--the news that Ross has broken here is absolutely
devastating to the Guantanamo military commissions process, because
they have been trotted out by General Hartmann, if you looked at his
interviews the last few days, as an effort to replicate Nuremberg and
the Nuremberg proceedings. And remember, Justice Robert Jackson, who
was responsible for organizing them, said very clearly, repeatedly,
it's important not only that justice be done here, but that these
proceedings appear to be just. In fact, the appearance of justice was
more important even than the underlying result in the proceedings.
AMY GOODMAN: In fact, there were some people in Nuremberg who were
acquitted.
SCOTT HORTON: Three in the opening proceeding alone. There were quite
a few people who were acquitted. And I think there was a broad
perception around the world that those proceedings were fair, that the
defendants had a full opportunity to defend themselves. And the US
accomplished its principal objective in those proceedings, which was
demonstrating to the world, but particularly to the audience at home
and Germany and then later with the Pacific tribunals in Japan, the
evil that had been done by these people who were put on trial. So it
was effective because it was just and fair.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, this statement, exactly what Davis said Haynes said--
Davis said, "at which point, [Haynes's] eyes got wide and he said,
'Wait a minute, we can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these
guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't
have acquittals, we've got to have convictions.'"
SCOTT HORTON: A devastating statement. It destroys the reputation for
fairness of these proceedings. You have to remember that Jim Haynes is
not just anybody. As the general counsel of the Department of Defense,
he's the person who stands near the apex of this process.
AMY GOODMAN: He's not the prosecutor.
SCOTT HORTON: He's not the prosecutor. The prosecutors report to him.
The defense counsel report to him. The judges report to him. The
convening authority reports to him. He stands over this entire
process. And he already has an established track record of intervening
in these cases for political purposes, for political manipulation. The
Wall Street Journal broke that story the third week of September when
they showed how he had intervened to mastermind the plea bargain in
the Hicks case, in which the prosecutors were excluded. Haynes was
involved doing this, and he was involved doing it basically to make
good on pledges that Vice President Cheney had made to the Australian
prime minister, to help out his friend in Australia in connection with
an election. So that already set the tone here.
AMY GOODMAN: David Hicks was an Australian prisoner at Guantanamo--
SCOTT HORTON: Exactly right.
AMY GOODMAN: --who was ultimately sent back to Australia.
SCOTT HORTON: And is now free. He was sent back. He was given the
minimum possible sentence that would allow his repatriation, his
return to Australia.
AMY GOODMAN: Ross Tuttle, response to this explosive piece, "Gitmo
Trials Rigged," to what Davis--what Colonel Davis is saying Haynes told
him?
ROSS TUTTLE: Well, I was--I mean, I guess--I don't know if I was that
surprised. I mean, I was surprised that somebody would say it or say
it for attribution or say it to somebody who then say it for
attribution, but, you know, in talking to a lot of people, I don't
know that that many people were surprised. You know, that sort of
registers with "Uh-huh," sort of "Yeah, I thought so."
But I feel like this is the first time, and why it struck me and why I
thought it was important to get out there, which was later confirmed
by a lot of the people that I spoke to when reporting, that this
really seems to be the first time that somebody at such a high level
has made such a statement that appears to be, you know, what a lot of
people have believed all along, that this process cannot result in
fair, open--you know, fair, open trials. And so, that's a concern.
And it, you know, hopefully--and I think what Davis is trying to do,
being out front on this issue, is trying to get people to recognize
that and get people to reevaluate the system and fix it, because I
think everybody--everybody involved--the detainees, the people in the
JAG Corps--I think, you know, most people involved, most people who pay
attention to this issue, they want to see justice done, but this
process seems deeply flawed.
AMY GOODMAN: Scott Horton, does conviction automatically mean death?
SCOTT HORTON: No, it doesn't automatically mean death. There's still a
discretionary process here. The United States--the prosecutors have
announced that they will seek the death penalty for at least some of
these detainees if they secure a conviction. But in our military
justice system, we haven't had an execution since 1961. Our system--our
military justice system very much--very strongly disfavors the death
penalty.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the role of the JAGs. Talk about the role of
the military lawyers and where they've stood over the years. Now, of
course, Davis has resigned.
SCOTT HORTON: Well, I think one thing we should stress up front is
that even the most severe critics of this process, for the most part,
stand in awe of the JAG Corps and the way they've handled things. I
mean, we've got a bunch of dedicated professionals who want to play
their jobs, want to play their roles competently and professionally.
And, in fact, professionalism has been the top note of the JAG Corps
since the beginning of this process.
And the concerns that are being articulated are about political
meddling with the work of the JAG Corps, intervention by political
appointees--and Haynes, I think, has been the most aggressive of them--
that stop the JAG officers from doing their proper roles and stop them
from functioning independently. And we've seen them stand up and
exercise independent judgment repeatedly. In fact, the first conflict
that they had with Haynes was over the torture memoranda. And that
memorandum that was described resulted in an order issued December
2nd, 2002 by Donald Rumsfeld that authorized torture techniques.
AMY GOODMAN: Have we ever seen this kind of standing up mass, standing
up before in--among military lawyers?
SCOTT HORTON: Absolutely unprecedented. In fact, I'd say, most
recently, when the Bush administration put forward the Military
Commissions Act, which the JAG lawyers didn't even get to see until
forty-eight hours before it was put forward on Congress, the Judge
Advocates General of the four service branches went to Capitol Hill
and testified against the legislation put forward by Gonzales and Jim
Haynes. That's never happened before in history.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to read a quote of Colonel Morris Davis. He
wrote a February 17th op-ed piece in the New York Times called
"Unforgivable Behavior, Inadmissible Evidence." He said, "Why a few
others in positions of power still find it so difficult to admit the
obvious about waterboarding is astounding. We can never retake the
moral high ground when we claim the right to do unto others that which
we would vehemently condemn if done to us. Once we condemn and stop
all waterboarding, what do we do in cases where it was conducted? An
obvious step is to prohibit the use of evidence derived by
waterboarding in criminal proceedings against detainees."
SCOTT HORTON: Well, he's stating essentially the prosecutor's dilemma.
You know, he was charged with prosecuting these cases. He knew that
waterboarding and other highly coercive techniques have been used on
the people he was prosecuting. He was presented with their confessions
to use as evidence. And he knew ethically and legally he couldn't do
that.
I think there's another very important thing that's latent in that
statement and was also charged very recently by Lieutenant Commander
Charlie Swift. He pointed to the fact that these proceedings are going
forward within a week of the time that we see official after official
of this administration, including President Bush and the head of the
Office of Legal Counsel and Attorney General Mukasey, coming forward
before Congress and other international fora to justify waterboarding.
Why are they doing that? They're doing that because they know that
this hangs in the background of these proceedings in Guantanamo, and
they want to press forward for the use of this coerced evidence, which
is really going to taint the proceedings and make a mockery of them
and embarrass the United States in the eyes of the world.
AMY GOODMAN: Ross Tuttle, you're also working on a piece on Benyam
Mohammed, another prisoner at Guantanamo.
ROSS TUTTLE: Correct. That's how I started on the story. It was a
documentary I had been working on for an ACLU documentary series that
covered rendition, extraordinary rendition, torture and habeas corpus.
Benyam Mohammed had, according to his own account, been a victim--well,
had fallen in all three of those categories. He has now been in
Guantanamo for about four years. Prior to that, according to a lengthy
diary that he transcribed to or that he told to his lawyer, Clive
Stafford Smith, he had spent eighteen months in a Moroccan prison as a
victim of extraordinary rendition, being grievously tortured. The
account that he provided to Smith then got out. It was declassified.
And it's really horrifying when you read it. And there are a lot of
details that corroborate the claims that he makes. A lot of people
have researched it, looked into it, and there are some--there is a lot
of corroborating evidence. But, I mean, if even a fraction of what he
says is true, it's really--I mean, it's a really horrific thing that
he's endured.
And so, I just felt like that his story needed to be told. I mean, I
felt like a lot of people who are still in Guantanamo, who are
languishing, who are awaiting trial, I mean, they just--you know,
according to their lawyers, I mean, they're just hoping--they just want
a fair trial. They just want something to be able to--you know, they
want to be able to face their accusers. And I felt like that was a
story that had been not necessarily forgotten, but it just had kind of
fallen out of the headlines. Not many people were paying that much
attention to it. It felt like in Europe a lot of people were really
focusing on this issue. And this story really disturbed me and was--
yeah, it was troubling. And that was the story that I initially sought
to tell when I contacted Davis.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Ross Tuttle, I want to thank you for joining us, LA-
based freelance documentary filmmaker and journalist. His piece is on
The Nation website at thenation.com. It's called "Gitmo Trials
Rigged." And Scott Horton, New York attorney specializing in
international law and human rights, legal affairs contributor to
Harper's magazine, where he writes the blog "No Comment."
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/2/20/guantanamo
= = = =
STILL FEELING LIKE THE MAINSTREAM U.S. CORPORATE MEDIA
IS GIVING A FULL HONEST PICTURE OF WHAT'S GOING ON?
= = = =
= = = =
Sorry, we cannot read/reply to most usenet posts but welcome email
FOR MORE INFORMATION: http://EconomicDemocracy.org/wtc/ (peace)
http://economicdemocracy.org/eco/climate-summary.html (Climate)
And http://EconomicDemocracy.org/ (general)
New email: econdemocracy[at]gmail[dot]com
