[Timber Loftis]

Just so you know, if the government designates you (a US Citizen), as it has done with 2 other Americans, as an "enemy combatant," they take away your lawyer and lock you up without a hearing.

NOte the one DOJ attorney states:
``We are confident we would have prevailed on the criminal charges,'' Fisher said. ``However, setting the criminal charges aside is in the best interests of our national security.''

That can't be true. Did I read that right? One wonders how these crazy government building bombers got so fed up one day -- NOT. The day we've written a law that encourages a prosecutor to drop a sound case so the feds can throw someone in jail WITHOUT A TRIAL is the day we should find the person responsible for that law and take turns kicking them in the balls.

Don't forget what the Monty Python boys say: "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition"
__________________________________________________ ____________

U.S. Gives Qatari Man Enemy Combatant Status
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 3:50 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A Qatar man alleged to have been paving the way for al-Qaida operatives to settle in the United States was designated Monday as an enemy combatant by President Bush and could ultimately face trial by a military tribunal, government officials said.

Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, 37, has been in custody since late 2001, first as a material witness and later on criminal charges of lying to the FBI and on a charge of credit card fraud. This new designation puts him under the control of the Defense Department, without most rights afforded defendants in the civilian U.S. criminal justice system.

Al-Marri is the third person identified by name as an enemy combatant since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and the only one who is not a U.S. citizen. In addition, there are more than 600 unidentified people captured on the battlefield as enemy combatants who are being interrogated at the U.S naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Yaser Esam Hamdi was captured in Afghanistan and later found to have been born in Louisiana. Jose Padilla is alleged to have been involved in a plot to detonate a radioactive ``dirty bomb'' in the United States.

Al-Marri's designation as an enemy combatant came after prosecutors Monday dropped the criminal charges against him. Alice Fisher, deputy assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's criminal division, said the decision was made not because that case was weak but because it was the best way to deter future terrorist attacks.

``We are confident we would have prevailed on the criminal charges,'' Fisher said. ``However, setting the criminal charges aside is in the best interests of our national security.''

Bush approved the designation of al-Marri as an enemy combatant Monday morning, she said.

Designation as an enemy combatant means that al-Marri has no right to representation by an attorney -- a situation that has drawn court challenges -- and that he could be held by the military indefinitely, possibly to face eventual trial by a military tribunal where fewer U.S. criminal justice rules apply.

Fisher said that al-Marri was ``positively identified'' as being part of a planned second wave of al-Qaida terrorist attacks by ``an al-Qaida detainee in a position to know.'' She would not identify that person, but officials have said that senior al-Qaida operative Khalid Shaikh Mohammed has provided a wealth of information about the network's presence in the United States.

Al-Marri's attorney, Mark Berman of Newark, N.J., said he believed the government decided to switch his client's status because al-Marri refused to cooperate and would not plead guilty as others accused in the war on terrorism have done.

``I'm not surprised but it makes you wonder how far the government is prepared to go in denying constitutional rights,'' Berman said.

The FBI first interviewed al-Marri on Oct. 2, 2001, after receiving a tip that he might be involved in terrorism. He was interviewed again in early December 2001 and then placed in custody as a material witness on Dec. 12, 2001.

Al-Marri was subsequently charged with lying about phone calls he made to a number in the United Arab Emirates used by Mustafa Ahmed al-Hisawi, who prosecutors say provided financial backing to the Sept. 11 hijackers.

Prosecutors also said in previous indictments that al-Marri ran a credit-card scam to finance al-Qaida activities.

Al-Marri was living in Peoria, Ill., where he had attended Bradley University to study computer science, receiving a bachelor's degree in 1991. After living abroad for a few years, al-Marri returned to the United States on a student visa on Sept. 10, 2001 -- the day before the attacks in New York and Washington.

In February, the Saudi Arabian government ignored a request from the State Department and issued a passport to al-Marri's wife and five young children, who have since left the United States.

Fisher said that al-Marri allegedly attended the same al-Farooq training camp in Afghanistan as numerous other would-be terrorists and met al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. Authorities believe al-Marri was trained in use of poisons but had not been sent to the United States to mount an attack.

Still, Larry Mefford, the FBI's assistant director for counterterrorism, said al-Marri's role in helping members of al-Qaida sleeper cells get established in the United States should not be minimized.

``He is somebody who posed a danger to the United States,'' Mefford said. ``Clearly, we think he is very important.''

[ 06-23-2003, 05:38 PM: Message edited by: Timber Loftis ]