Unlawful Combatants detained at Guantanamo Bay finally get some rights

[Grojlach]

Detainees have right to U.S. courts, justices rule

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed down a mixed verdict on the Bush administration's war against terror, ruling that U.S. and non-U.S. citizens alike seized as potential terrorists can challenge their treatment in U.S. courts.

The high court supported the U.S. federal government in one important respect, ruling that Congress gave President Bush the authority to seize and hold a U.S. citizen, Louisiana-born Yaser Esam Hamdi, as an alleged enemy combatant.

But the court ruled that Hamdi could use American courts to argue that he is being held illegally.

Additionally, foreign-born men held at a Navy prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, can also have their day in U.S. courts, the justices said in ruling on a separate case.

The court sidestepped a third major terrorism case, ruling that a lawsuit filed on behalf of detainee Jose Padilla improperly named Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld instead of the much lower-level military officer in charge of the Navy brig in South Carolina where Padilla has been held for more than two years.

Padilla must refile a lawsuit challenging his detention in a lower court.

The Justice Department had no immediate reaction to the rulings.

But lawyers for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a legal advocacy group that has been representing the Guantanamo detainees, hailed the ruling.

"The Supreme Court has not closed the doors of justice to the detainees imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay," said the group's president, Michael Ratner. "This is a major victory for the rule of law and affirms the right of every person, citizen or non-citizen, detained by the United States to test the legality of his or her detention in a U.S. Court."

"What appears to be going on here is some sort of compromise," said CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin. "The court feels strongly about national security and the president's ability to conduct foreign affairs and military affairs, yet also responsible for the rule of law." (Toobin analysis)

Reaction was quick from other quarters, as well.

"Today's historic rulings are a strong repudiation of the administration's argument that its actions in the war on terrorism are beyond the rule of law and unreviewable by American courts," said Steven R. Shapiro, director of the American Civil Liberties Union, in a written statement.

The ACLU filed friend-of-the-court briefs in all three cases.

"The Supreme Court's verdicts show that, contrary to what the administration believes, we can have both security and liberty," added Sen. Charles Schumer, D-New York, in a written statement.

"Congress should now enact legislation that reflects the court's carefully balanced decisions on liberty and security. The Judiciary Committee ought to hold hearings immediately to begin the process of enacting legislation."

In the case of Hamdi, a U.S. citizen captured on a battlefield outside the United States and held for more than two years at a navy brig in Charleston, South Carolina, the court ruled that U.S. authorities have the right to hold him, but that he has the right to challenge his detention.

Congress voted shortly after the September 11 attacks to give the president significant authority to pursue terrorists, but Hamdi's lawyers said that authority did not extend to the indefinite detention of a U.S. citizen without charges or trial.

Writing for the 6-3 majority in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said, "As critical as the government's interest may be in detaining those who actually pose an immediate threat to the national security of the United States during ongoing international conflict, history and common sense teach us that an unchecked system of detention carries the potential to become a means for oppression and abuse of others who do not present that sort of threat."

Justices Antonin Scalia, William Rehnquist and Clarence Thomas dissented.

"This detention falls squarely within the federal government's war powers, and we lack the expertise and capacity to second-guess that decision," Thomas wrote in the dissenting opinion.

"They did the right thing," said Hamdi's lawyer, Frank Dunham, when told of the ruling. "The court had to stand up for Hamdi. It's about all of us. You can't have a situation where the president can lock someone up and they can't have the opportunity to be heard."

In the Guantanamo case ruling, the court consolidated two cases -- Rusul v. Bush and al Odah v. U.S. -- involving a British-born and a Kuwaiti-born man. The rulings could affect the approximately 600 non-U.S.-born men being held in the Navy prison on Guantanamo.

The court said the Cuban base is not beyond the reach of American courts even though it is outside the country.

Lawyers for the detainees there had said to rule otherwise would be to declare the Cuban base a legal no-man's land.

The Bush administration contends that as "enemy combatants," the men are not entitled to the usual rights of prisoners of war set out in the Geneva Conventions.

The Associated Press reported that the high court's ruling applies only to Guantanamo detainees, although the United States holds foreign prisoners elsewhere.

Writing for the 6-3 majority, Justice John Paul Stevens said U.S. authorities have the right to hold the men, but that they have the right to challenge their detention in a U.S. court.

In the Padilla case, his attorney, Donna Newman said, "Today the Supreme Court did not rule that the president has the authority to detain an American citizen on American soil. What they did was delay the inevitable -- that Padilla must be charged with a crime."

The cases are: Hamdi v. Rumsfeld (03-6696), Rumsfeld v. Padilla (03-1027), Rasul v. Bush (03-334) and Al Odah v. United States (03--0343).

Source: CNN

[johnny]

Too late Bob, Dreamer beat you to it.

According to the Non-Lawerese English translation I heard it was ruled:

A: COngress DID Empower the President to call anyone he wanted an Enemy Combatant weather foreign or domestic(ie. a US Citizen) and to put the bag on them.(grab them and hold them)

B: They could be held without a TRIAL (lawyers, press, Jury) and without specific charges.

C: The subject DOES have the right to a "HEARING" by a disinterested party (which is good since then if there is a specific person to do the hearings they can get someone with a security clearence who can be vetted) at wich time the Government can show the reason they grabbed the guy in the first place.

All in all this is not much of a terible shot to Bush. It actually makes sense and won't entail security leaks by the press and a pack of lawyers. The guy may have one lawyer or representative present at the hearing...but maybe not...they werent real clear on that part.

[ 06-28-2004, 08:00 PM: Message edited by: MagiK ]

[Grojlach]

Originally posted by johnny: Too late Bob, Dreamer beat you to it.

Yeah, by what? Like 10 minutes. Which isn't too painful if you realise Ironworks was down again for 20 minutes right beforehand.

[johnny]

Ooooooh...cranky.

[Chewbacca]

It seems the ruling caught the DoD by suprise-

Source-VOA

Defense officials were expecting what they believed would be a big court victory in the war on terrorism. But they were caught off-guard by this week's U.S. Supreme Court rulings that terrorist suspects held by the military, both foreign nationals and American, have the right to challenge their detention in the U.S. court system.
The Supreme Court rulings have been described by civil rights groups as a defeat for the Bush administration and its assertion of sweeping powers to indefinitely hold what it calls enemy combatants in the war on terror.

Since the decisions were handed down Monday, Pentagon officials have had little to say other than to tell reporters the rulings are being reviewed by defense department lawyers.

That is because the Pentagon was expecting an endorsement of administration policies and was caught off-guard by the unfavorable rulings, which defense officials now admit came as a complete surprise.

The officials' admissions are confirmed by an internal document, obtained by VOA, which outlined a communications strategy to be followed by Pentagon and other government spokesman in responding to the court. The document was written last week and was based on the assumption that key cases would be decided in favor of the Bush administration.

For example, in the cases brought by foreign-born Guantanamo detainees seeking access to U.S. courts, the planning document anticipated a close five-to-four decision but stated, quoting now, "we will treat any decision short of outright rejection as a victory."

In fact, the Supreme Court ruled six-to-three against the administration, declaring non-U.S. citizens held at the United States naval base at Guantanamo Bay can appeal to federal courts to argue that they are being unlawfully held.

In the case of U.S.-born terrorist suspect Yaser Hamdi, held at a military base in South Carolina, the administration's planning document also predicted a favorable decision in what was termed "a clear-cut Prisoner of War case."

As it turned out, the justices ruled eight-to-one that Mr. Hamdi should get an opportunity to rebut the government's case for detaining him before a neutral party. Four court members would have released him, arguing his detention was unlawful.

The communications planning document, prepared jointly by the Pentagon and the Justice Department, only once mentions the possibility of decisions unfavorable to the Bush administration.

In that case, it says the administration, as it put it, should "be prepared to have supporters outside the Departments of Defense and Justice carry the standard by engaging with the media to decry this miscarriage of justice."

In case of a positive decision, the document urged officials, quoting again, to "ensure maximum media coverage to overcome those who will continue to criticize the detention of enemy combatants.

So far, officials at both the Justice Department and the Pentagon, seeking to put the best possible face on the rulings, have only noted the high court affirmed the President's authority to detain enemy combatants in the war on terrorism.

Not the voice of an angry emmotional article author is it? [img]smile.gif[/img] Whatever happened to just printing the story without all the invective?

Probably should have been in the Op-Ed section.


[ 06-30-2004, 01:46 PM: Message edited by: MagiK ]