Federal Judiciary

Court probe opened on CIA tapes dispute

By Akin Gump Supreme Court Practice Group

In a new echo of the Supreme Court’s 2004 ruling that Guantanamo Bay detainees have legal rights to challenge their captivity, a federal judge on Thursday ordered a limited inquiry into the government’s destruction of videotapes of Central Intelligence Agency interrogation of war-on-terrorism suspects. Lawyers for a Yemeni national who asked for that judicial probe had contended that the tapes may well include accusations against him — information that should have been kept for use in court review under Rasul v. Bush (2004) of his prolonged detention.

U.S. District Judge Richard W. Roberts, silently refusing a Justice Department request to take no action while a Department criminal investigation of the tapes’ destruction proceeds, and putting aisde a Department claim that he has no jurisdiction to act, ordered government officials on Thursday to file a written report by Feb. 14 on whether any evidence that the judge had ordered preserved has been “destroyed or otherwise spoliated.” The judge’s order can be downloaded here.

The case involves Hani Saleh Rashid Abdullah, an electrician from Yemen, who was captured in Karachi, Pakistan, on September 11, 2002, during a series of raids by U.S. forces in search of suspected members of the al Qaeda terrorist network. Abdulllah’s lawyers contend that he went to Pakistan to further his studies of the Koran, while U.S. officials contend he went there for weapons training in al Qaeda camps.

Full post as published by SCOTUSBLOG on January 25, 2008 (boomark / email).