Litigation

Judge Denies Obama?s Bid to Suspend Detainee?s Proceedings

By Deanna Dawson

The chief judge at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay has denied President Obama’s request for a moratorium in the prosecution of Abd al Rahim al Nashiri. Despite prosecutors’ and defense lawyers’ agreement to the delay, Army Col. James L. Pohl said that the president’s request for a four-month suspension in the proceedings is “not reasonable.”

Abd al Rahim al Nashiri is charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism, murder and attempted murder in violation of the laws of war, and terrorism for his alleged role in the attack on the U.S.S. Cole. He is one of the detainees that the Bush administration admitted to waterboarding in order to obtain information. If convicted, al Nashiri could face the death penalty.

Judicial scholars were consulted regarding Judge Pohl’s refusal to grant the president’s request. “Technically, it’s within the judge’s discretion to treat this as a request or a motion on the part of the prosecutors and the government,” said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond. “We like to think that even military judges are independent, to some extent, of the commander in chief.”

Full post as published by The Gavel on January 30, 2009 (boomark / email).