Every time I come there are new rules. Today my briefcase and wallet were taken from me before I could meet with client. They claimed my briefcase looked like a purse which of course resulted with me asking if I should bring a more masculine looking briefcase next time…
but on a more serious level they are reconsidering a change in rule that allows us to bring books to our clients. For the last six or eight months we have been allowed to bring with us books that are for our clients that we turn over to the guards for screening and a few days later they are delivered to our clients and they can keep them in their cell. Seems now they are thinking that this is not fair to the men who do not have attorneys, sigh.
I would tell you what my client had to say about this possible change in rule (and the reason for the change) but then I would have to be sent to prison because my client notes have not been cleared yet and so his comments are classified.
Anyway they took the books that I brought for my clients because the ban on books has not taken effect yet but just “being considered.”
just a day in the life.

Thought it was important to respond while I am here at Guantanamo so that the DOD, DOJ, CIA etc are all aware of your move….wouldn’t want to leave them behind would we?
Anyway, you have by far have had some of the best detailed coverage of Gitmo issues and there has been many a time when I learned stuff here from you and those responding that I managed to stick into a brief here and there. And then of course there are all those other issues that you managed to provide detail and insight into as well. Amazing stuff and I am looking forward following you (and bmazey :) )at your new digs.

I’m for giving monkeys wings….
Thank you for raising the question I ask myself almost every day. What do you do when there is no justice? When your profession is based on a system that no longer exists? I am not talking about winning and losing…in a justice system some will win and some will lose. That is ok. But this is not justice because no one wins.
I don’t have the answer so I keep banging my head against the wall.
I quess Mary has the answer… “Time to drink.”

I moved Lamberth to recuse himself after that speech cited by OnionATL and the judge did ultimately recuse himself in my clients case….but not until the DOJ fessed up that one of the DOD attorneys assigned to my clients case had an exparte conversation with the Judge regarding their discovery obligations…
If I get Silberman in my remaining clients panel I will move to recuse him as well for his statements in his concurring decision which I discussed and cite to on my blog here:
http://gtmoblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/any-judge-that-refuses-to-follow-law.html
This is where Silberman admitted that they were using a different standard in deciding the habeas petitions than even what the government said should be the standard….and while habeas counsel had been holding out for a higher standard than “preponderance” the circus court had secretly lowered the standard to the “whatever shit the government can pull together is enough” standard.
As Moe Davis points out above we have to keep these issues in their faces and even though we know there will never be another winning guantanamo habeas case I will be in their face for the long run.
By the way check out Moe’s excellent article here:
http://www.moonhowlings.net/index.php/2011/06/03/torture-finding-our-moral-compass/

Sorry. I was just daydreaming.

These are definitely the procedures for article III courts- whether it is the same for the commissions I could only guess. My client-like most of the men at guantanamo- will never be charged in a commission- will never be charged in a federal court, and will just languish at guantanamo unless he wins his habeas or someone just decides its time to send him home.

I just reread the three page instruction manual that I received from the court security office yesterday so I could try to figure out exactly what I can say here-and do in the future- with regards to the wikileaks. I don’t think any of us received the wikileaks in discovery but I really can only speak for myself. The wikileak documents are now going to be made available to us at the secret place-where we work on secret stuff-and this latest secret stuff is about as lame as the earlier secret stuff…but anyway, I digress. We can use the wikileaks in court documents but we have to file it under seal from the secret place. We can now access, comment and cite to secondary reporting-like emptywheel here- for the last month or so I have been avoiding putting anything on my blog that even mentioned wikileaks but now I can do that. We can talk publicly about the information that is in the public domain but not to the extent that it would reveal stuff we learned from non public sources.
Just to clarify one thing- although it seems like everything gets filed under seal in the gitmo cases that is not exactly correct although it was at one time- many of us try very hard to file as much as we can on the public docket by keeping to non-classified and non “protected” (stuff that is embarassing but not classified!) information.
So let me see, what can I say about the lying sack of shit regarding my client? if one were to look at the public version of the governments Return in my clients case (the Return is the Answer to the Habeas Petition) one would see that the lies in the Return are actually quite different than the lies in the wikileaks. All lies nonetheless but different lies.

ahhh, a blog without reference to wikileaks so I can read and respond…what a great country.
Getting back to a response I left a few days ago about my conversation with GW Obama before he decided he was presidential material— after I listed a bunch of his votes which were beyond the pale he looked at me and said “Oh, I know….you’ve been reading the blogs.” As though that somehow would explain his votes…..
But anyway that was me in 2006, I wasn’t reading blogs (I didn’t realize then that they could be more informative than anything I would ever pick up in a “news” paper-) and I looked at him like he was crazy and I said “I don’t know about blogs but I get every single one of your votes emailed to me.” He didn’t get it….that someone (a constituent) actually was paying attention.
Shortly thereafter I learned about blogs (thank the gods….).

GW Obama really does not take criticism well. back when he was just my junior senator and before he threw his hat in the ring I spoke to him at a small fundraiser luncheon…I was ready for the opportunity to tell him what I thought of his first year and a half or so in the senate and I had the opportunity. When I told him he should be ashamed- as a civil rights attorney and constitutional law professor (I didn’t realize he was only an instructor!) for voting for the 2005 detainee treatment act he shot back “it was going to pass anyway” and I shot back and said “oh, so that’s your standard now?” There was more said…mostly by me. Before he left he walked to every table and shook hands with every single person in the room-except me….and as I stared at him walking out of the room he turned and looked at me and said “and don’t forget to send me an email with your other concerns….” I said “yeah right…” I had worked on his senate campaign and I was surprised at the fact that he was unable to handle criticism.

Speaking of show trials things aren’t much better in federal court these days. In my remaining gitmo client’s habeas hearing in December the government’s position was that my guy should be held forever because he was arrested at the same guesthouse as Abu Zubaydah. In Abu Zubaydah’s case the government has admitted that after waterboarding him 100 or so times it seems he wasn’t who they thought he was….sorry about that Mr. Z….but anyway the judge announced that just being in the house was enough for him to deny the writ but the government put on a show trial trying to show that my client went by a nickname and that the nicknamed belonged to a known bad guy. They had two “detainee” statements linking the nickname to my client. After four days of hearing and just before the judge was set to rule the government pulled the statement from detainee witness number 1-because they had not given me certain documents that went to that detainees reliability. That left one detainee witness, a man the government claimed never complained of torture or mistreatment. I had nothing to rebut their characterization of this man as being what could have been the only man at Guantanamo not to have complained of torture. I asked for a new trial because of the evidence pulled and the judge said no and denied the writ for my client because the remaining detainee witness was reliable. Lo and behold that star witness-the only man at Guantanamo never to complain of being tortured- took a plea in the commission last month and the military released a bunch of court documents from his case onto their website-seems the government was not exactly being truthful about this guy not complaining-he alleged that he was subjected to enhanced techniques right at the same time he said the nickname belonged to my client. MY MY. I filed another motion for new hearing- government says I should quit whining as it doesn’t matter anyway. Sad part is that it probably won’t matter….but I am whining anyway.

I sure don’t see any reason why you can’t post on it I just don’t want people sending me posts to try to “help me.” My client’s interest is my biggest concern which is why I maintained the fight for my own first amendment right to an opinion but pulled back about the wikileaks when I thought I might not win on that issue (given my security clearance and the fact that the email documents were classified). I already had a court order in my other case that the rest of the world could talk about a certain issue involving my other client…but I could not (sigh).
It turns out the court security office sent out an email to all of the habeas counsel when the first wikileaks emails were dumped-warning us not to look at them or talk about them or dream about them or some shit- but I was too busy preparing for my client’s habeas hearing and didn’t notice- and DOJ was busy doing everything it could to undermine the hearing and they didn’t notice my post- so several weeks after the hearing was over they got back to their spying and reported my post…

Well…dare I say, everything has become worse in the gitmo litigation under GW obama. I will start by just saying that every document is pretty much considered classified now and in the past (pre October 2008) the documents were declassified within a few days- now they are never declassified unless you can get a judge to order it declassified. I have a motion pending right now begging judge Leon to declassify my remaining clients Traverse- the final pleading in the habeas case- so that the world can see that there is another side to my client’s story (I also need it declassified so I can let my client know he does have valid defenses and to discuss with him his appeal…and for various other reasons) We shall see what,if anything, the judge does.
My latest infraction involved inviting people to share with me on my blog what they learned from the wikileaks if it involved guantanamo. I was forced to take that blog down (and please don’t share with me…even if tempted) because the DOJ (who monitors my blog) called the court security office to complaint that I was in violation of the protective order. After a “discussion” I was “allowed” to leave up that portion of my blog referring to Wikileaks as hero’s- but not allowed to ask people to post or email any wikileaks related to gitmo. Two years ago I had a similar (but different) battle but I won’t bore you with those details now.
We habeas counsel have also long been forbidden to talk with our clients about anything classified-even if the classified information originally came from our clients.
There is some quote about fighting with one hand behind your back but from where I sit one hand almost seems fair.

“For the record, I was cross-trained in legal while in the U.S. Navy (1983-1987), and was an honor graduate of Naval Justice School in Newport, Rhode Island. When it came time for me to reenlist, I chose not to for many reasons, but largely because I thought “Military Justice” was an oxymoron. There is no such thing, and if you believe that people in the military are given a fair trial, you’re wrong.”

The fact that he is saying that the military cannot provide justice is also a nice little slap in the face to GW Obama’s latest executive order reinstating the military tribunals…

Thanks, I must have put in the wrong case number.

Excellent work. Every once in a while it is nice to be a lawyer.
I went on pacer to see who the scumbags were in the DOJ that are handling the case and was surprised to see the entire case in under seal….I guess that is so Bloch’s reputation in not too terribly damaged? sigh.

if anyone notices references to Guantanamo…including (but not limited to…) deals being made for countries accepting detainees….could you please post. I saw there was reference to Belgium and one of the stans but the search engine isn’t very good and I was not able to see the actual context.
thanks