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Guantanamo Bay, Cuba — Navy Captain John Murphy, the chief military prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay, announced today that military prosecutors were ready to proceed with cases against 66 of the more than 220 security detainees held at the naval facility in Guantanamo Bay.
Speaking to more than two dozen reporters at Guantanamo, Murphy said that he was "personally comfortable" that the government could mount a case that would not depend on evidence gathered through the use of coercion.
"We have 66 viable cases," Captain Murphy said. The chief military prosecutor went on to say that he "would not draw timelines" regarding what evidence would and would not be used. Reporters raised questions suggesting that any evidence obtained after abusive techniques were employed could be considered tainted. Captain Murphy declined to answer these questions.
Independent observers said they were concerned that the prosecutor’s office would be making decisions about what evidence was appropriate and what evidence was not appropriate to use without any independent review.
"They say repeatedly that they are not going to rely on evidence that was obtained using coercion," said Vic Hansen, a former Army Judge Advocate General officer who is observing this week’s proceedings for the National Institute of Military Justice. "Well, it’s the prosecution who is making that call alone without any transparency."
Captain Murphy said that the prosecution had developed "a standard" to ensure that no evidence obtained improperly would be used in the trials. But he declined to elaborate on that standard.
"What it comes down to is more or less the government saying, ‘just trust us,’" said Hansen.
David Danzig is the Deputy Program Director at Human Rights First. He is observing proceedings against security detainees held at Guantanamo Bay.
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“Lawyers for Zayn al-Abidin Muhammed Hussein — known more widely by the name Abu Zubaida — say the Pentagon has capriciously classified their client’s writings and statements to investigators, raising questions of why the government has sought to keep Zubaida’s assertions private. They argue, plausibly, that the US’ penchant for secrecy in Zubaida’s case may be linked to efforts to keep controversial intelligence activities out of the public eye.
Remarkably, the Pentagon has refused to provide transcripts of the Zubaida’s military tribunal even to his own lawyers.
Zubaida’s “lawyers argue that the material should never have been classified in the first place,” Pincus writes. “They add, however, that they still have yet to receive ‘an unredacted complete transcript’ of [his] 2007 tribunal.”
The US executive order that allows for classification asserts that material to be classified must be “owned,” “produced” or “controlled” by the US government. The Justice Department has argued that because they effectively “own” Zubaida as a prisoner, they are in control of information he might provide.
His lawyers disagree. “
http://rawstory.com/08/news/20…..n-lawyers/
Assertions in the absence of any real transparency are a feature of the Guantanamo military commissions process. If you look at its bumbling track record to date more than a little skepticism is in order. For one thing how can Chief Prosecutor Murphy say that they are ready to try anyone when the Obama Administration has indicated that the current commissions structure would not be the one it would use? How too does Murphy square 66 trials with Obama’s pledge to close Guantanamo within one year? Previous attempts to move to trial stalled out because of massive ineptitude and mismanagement by prosecutors. Is there any evidence that this has changed? I’m not seeing it.
Yeah- when you’re proud of your standards, you always decline to elaborate on them.
That Bush and Obama have taken the US military to such a place is beyond horrible. God won’t forgive either of them. Unfortunately, there are always a thousand ways to be dishonorable, for every one, hard path to honor.