The US government via the prosecuting attorney crows about the conviction secured of Jose Padilla. It's a trial which has been keenly observed for a host of reasons, not the least of all the alleged basis for the charges against Padilla. No less importantly, is the background to the trial as explained by Amy Goodman on Democracy Now [and reproduced on AlterNet]:
"On Thursday, the jury in the Jose Padilla terror trial has found the American citizen guilty of conspiracy to support Islamic terrorism overseas. His sentencing is set for December 5 and he faces possible life in prison.
The FBI initially arrested him in Chicago in 2002 after he got off a plane from Europe. For a month he was held as a material witness. Then Attorney General John Ashcroft made a dramatic announcement -- the U.S. government had disrupted an al-Qaeda plot to set off nuclear dirty bombs inside the United States. At the center of the plot, Ashcroft alleged, was Padilla.
President Bush then classified Jose Padilla as an enemy combatant, stripping him of all his rights. He was transferred to a Navy brig in South Carolina where he was held in extreme isolation for forty three months.
The Christian Science Monitor reported: "Padilla's cell measured nine feet by seven feet. The windows were covered over… He had no pillow. No sheet. No clock. No calendar. No radio. No television. No telephone calls. No visitors. Even Padilla's lawyer was prevented from seeing him for nearly two years."
According to his attorneys, Padilla was routinely tortured in ways designed to cause pain, anguish, depression and ultimately the loss of will to live.
His lawyers have claimed that Padilla was forced to take LSD and PCP to act as a sort of truth serum during his interrogations.
Up until last year the Bush administration maintained it had the legal right to hold Padilla without charge forever. But when faced with a Supreme Court challenge, President Bush transferred Padila out of military custody to face criminal conspiracy charges.
On January 3, 2006 the government charged him and two others with criminal conspiracy. The government claims Padilla, along with his mentor, Adham Amin Hassoun, and Hassoun's colleague, Kifah Wael Jayyousi, conspired to commit murder abroad and to provide material support toward that goal.
Since May the men have been on trial in Miami. According to the Miami Herald, the overall case against Padilla is riddled with circumstantial evidence. Much of the case is built around an alleged form Padilla filled out to attend an al-Qaeda training camp.
Prosecutors have no introduced no evidence of personal involvement by Padilla in planning or carrying out any violent acts. There is no mention of Padilla -- plotting to set off a dirty bomb.
Questions have also been raised about whether Padilla was mentally fit to stand trial. His lawyers and family say he has become clearly mentally ill after being held in isolation."
Ready the full piece here - and be not only dismayed and horrified by the actions of all involved in this seeming travesty of "justice" but that the US expects the world to see the Americans as showing the ways of a fair and decent justice system.
It is "interesting" too to read the NY Times editorial on the Padilla case and the conviction:
"The administration is already claiming victory, but the result in Mr. Padilla’s case is in many ways a mess. He will likely never be brought to trial on the dirty-bomb plot, a much publicized charge that cries out for resolution. (In another move worthy of Alice in Wonderland, the government is holding another prisoner in Guantánamo, Binyam Mohamed, because he was accused of conspiring with Mr. Padilla in the dirty-bomb plot for which Mr. Padilla was never charged.) There is also the danger that Mr. Padilla’s conviction will be reversed on appeal because of his alleged mistreatment before trial. In hailing the verdict yesterday, a White House spokesman thanked the jury for “upholding a core American principle of impartial justice for all.” It is a remarkable statement, since the administration did everything it could to keep Mr. Padilla away from a jury and deny him impartial justice."
"On Thursday, the jury in the Jose Padilla terror trial has found the American citizen guilty of conspiracy to support Islamic terrorism overseas. His sentencing is set for December 5 and he faces possible life in prison.
The FBI initially arrested him in Chicago in 2002 after he got off a plane from Europe. For a month he was held as a material witness. Then Attorney General John Ashcroft made a dramatic announcement -- the U.S. government had disrupted an al-Qaeda plot to set off nuclear dirty bombs inside the United States. At the center of the plot, Ashcroft alleged, was Padilla.
President Bush then classified Jose Padilla as an enemy combatant, stripping him of all his rights. He was transferred to a Navy brig in South Carolina where he was held in extreme isolation for forty three months.
The Christian Science Monitor reported: "Padilla's cell measured nine feet by seven feet. The windows were covered over… He had no pillow. No sheet. No clock. No calendar. No radio. No television. No telephone calls. No visitors. Even Padilla's lawyer was prevented from seeing him for nearly two years."
According to his attorneys, Padilla was routinely tortured in ways designed to cause pain, anguish, depression and ultimately the loss of will to live.
His lawyers have claimed that Padilla was forced to take LSD and PCP to act as a sort of truth serum during his interrogations.
Up until last year the Bush administration maintained it had the legal right to hold Padilla without charge forever. But when faced with a Supreme Court challenge, President Bush transferred Padila out of military custody to face criminal conspiracy charges.
On January 3, 2006 the government charged him and two others with criminal conspiracy. The government claims Padilla, along with his mentor, Adham Amin Hassoun, and Hassoun's colleague, Kifah Wael Jayyousi, conspired to commit murder abroad and to provide material support toward that goal.
Since May the men have been on trial in Miami. According to the Miami Herald, the overall case against Padilla is riddled with circumstantial evidence. Much of the case is built around an alleged form Padilla filled out to attend an al-Qaeda training camp.
Prosecutors have no introduced no evidence of personal involvement by Padilla in planning or carrying out any violent acts. There is no mention of Padilla -- plotting to set off a dirty bomb.
Questions have also been raised about whether Padilla was mentally fit to stand trial. His lawyers and family say he has become clearly mentally ill after being held in isolation."
Ready the full piece here - and be not only dismayed and horrified by the actions of all involved in this seeming travesty of "justice" but that the US expects the world to see the Americans as showing the ways of a fair and decent justice system.
It is "interesting" too to read the NY Times editorial on the Padilla case and the conviction:
"The administration is already claiming victory, but the result in Mr. Padilla’s case is in many ways a mess. He will likely never be brought to trial on the dirty-bomb plot, a much publicized charge that cries out for resolution. (In another move worthy of Alice in Wonderland, the government is holding another prisoner in Guantánamo, Binyam Mohamed, because he was accused of conspiring with Mr. Padilla in the dirty-bomb plot for which Mr. Padilla was never charged.) There is also the danger that Mr. Padilla’s conviction will be reversed on appeal because of his alleged mistreatment before trial. In hailing the verdict yesterday, a White House spokesman thanked the jury for “upholding a core American principle of impartial justice for all.” It is a remarkable statement, since the administration did everything it could to keep Mr. Padilla away from a jury and deny him impartial justice."
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