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Big SDFLA day

By David Oscar Markus

Judge Cooke will impose sentence this morning in the Padilla case. The CSM asks the following question:

Can a suspected future terrorist receive the same harsh punishment meted out against actual terrorists who were personally involved in planning or carrying out genuine bombings, assassinations, and kidnappings?

The article then tracks some of Michael Caruso's arguments:

In a hearing on Friday, Padilla's lawyer, Acting Federal Public Defender Michael Caruso, argued that there is no comparison between his client's conduct and the conduct of convicted terrorists currently serving sentences of life in prison.
?Richard Reid attempted to detonate a shoe bomb on a crowded commercial airliner over the Atlantic Ocean in December 2001.
?Zacarias Moussaoui admitted to infiltrating the US to serve in a second wave of Al Qaeda attacks similar to the massive 9/11 terrorist attacks.
?Ramzi Yousef planned the 1993 World Trade Center bombing that killed six and injured at least 1,000 and was the mastermind of a foiled 1995 plot to assassinate the pope and simultaneously bomb 11 airliners carrying 4,000 passengers.
?Wadi El-Hage helped plan the 1998 bombing of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 and injured 4,500.

Professor Berman at his sentencing blog is covering the case here.

And the retrial of another big case starts up today, but I can't comment on it.

Full post as published by Southern District of Florida on January 22, 2008 (boomark / email).