Terrorism

The unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property in order to coerce or intimate a government or the civilian population in furtherance of political or social objectives.

Guantanamo Bay Developments

In May 2006, the Pentagon released a list of individuals who are being held in a detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, under suspicion of terrorist activities. This list was allegedly the first complete list of Guantanamo detainees released to the public since the detention center was established more than four years ago, after the September 11th attacks in 2001.

The Associated Press had requested the names, photos, and other details of current and former detainees under the Freedom of Information Act in January 2006, and had filed a lawsuit in March after the Pentagon had not responded to the request.

A Pentagon spokesman said that the names had been kept classified because of the security operations and intelligence operations that occur at Guantanamo Bay, but he did not comment on why the Pentagon chose not to contest the Associated Press's request.

Although the list of names will help lawyers and human rights advocates track down detainees in order to investigate allegations of abuse at Guantanamo, the list did not include the names of some top terrorists in custody, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh, who have been accused of plotting the attacks of September 11, 2001. Although the most recent list included more than 200 names that had not previously been disclosed by the Department of Defense, questions persist about the existence of a "secret prison" at Guantanamo Bay. A spokesperson from the Department of Defense has denied the existence of other detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay, however.

The Pentagon had released a list of more than 500 names to the Associated Press in April 2006, when ordered to do so by a federal judge in response the Freedom of Information Act request, but the list was not complete.

"This list takes us one step closer to our goal of fully reporting who has been swept into U.S. military custody in Guantanamo, and how they and their cases are being handled," said David Tomlin, the assistant general counsel for the Associated Press.

The interest in contacting detainees stems in part from allegations of prisoner abuse that surfaced in late 2004, when agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation reported the use of loud music, bright lights, and growling dogs to disorient and intimidate prisoners. The agents also reported having seen prisoners chained to the floor. An ongoing, high-level military investigation was initiated once the Pentagon became aware of the reports.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice denied the allegations of torture at Guantanamo during a television interview in Liverpool, England, in April 2006.

"We don't want to be the world's jailer, and we certainly want to try people or release them," Rice said in the interview. "One of the misunderstandings about Guantanamo is the sense that somehow hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people have been there forever with no prospect of release. Indeed, we have released hundreds of people from Guantanamo either because we've deemed them not as dangerous as thought or because we've released them to their governments, as we did with Great Britain."

The U.S. Supreme Court addressed the question of how to manage the legal rights of the Guantanamo detainees in 2006. President Bush had used his prerogative as commander in chief during times of war and mandated that military tribunals would try the detainees, rather than civilian courts. In 2004, the Court ruled that the president could not indefinitely detain prisoners without filing charges. Later in 2004, U.S. District Judge James Robertson found that Guantanamo Bay detainees should be considered prisoners of war and therefore entitled to certain protections under the Geneva Conventions, including the right to hear the charges against them.

Many detainees have challenged their imprisonment. In 2006, the U.S. Supreme Court was scheduled to rule on whether the detainees would be tried in military or civilian courts. Without a Supreme Court ruling, "it will be difficult for military commissions and status-review panels to decide fairly whether a detainee is a prisoner of war, after top Executive Branch and military leaders have declared all of them enemy combatants, not POWs," said Eugene R. Fidell, a Washington, DC-based lawyer specializing in military justice, in an interview with the Washington Post in 2004.

In an interesting twist, four British citizens who had been held at Guantanamo Bay for three years and then released to Great Britain won the right in 2006 to sue Donald Rumsfeld, the U.S. Secretary of Defense, for damages. The former detainees have stated that they will seek $10 million in damages from Rumsfeld and ten other military commanders for violating their religious rights by forcing them to shave their beards, harassing them during their worship activities, and forcing them to watch a Guantanamo guard flush a copy of the Muslim holy book, the Koran, down a toilet.

Cases Against Padilla and Moussaoui Continue

During 2005 and 2006, two terrorist suspects continued their legal disputes. Jose Padilla, who was designated by President George W. Bush as an "enemy combatant" in 2002, petitioned a federal district court in South Carolina for a writ of habeas corpus in an effort to force the U.S. government either to charge him with a crime or release him. Although the trial court agreed with Padilla, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the trial court's decision. In a second criminal case, Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person charged for the September 11th attacks in 2001, received a life sentence by a federal court in Virginia.

According to court records, Padilla, a U.S. citizen and native of Brooklyn, received training from al Qaeda in Afghanistan in 2000 and 2001. After the terrorist attacks in 2001, Padilla was present as U.S. forces fought Taliban forces in Afghanistan. He eventually escaped to Pakistan, where he continued to communicate with al Qaeda operatives. One senior planner for the terrorist organization, Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, directed Padilla to travel to the United States in order to conduct terrorist activities. Officials accused Padilla of leading a plot to set off a radioactive "dirty" bomb and of planning to blow up apartment buildings.

When Padilla arrived at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation immediately arrested him pursuant to a warrant issued by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Federal agents transported him to New York, where he was held at a civilian correctional facility. On June 9, 2002, Bush designated Padilla as an enemy combatant pursuant to a federal statute enacted shortly after the terrorist attacks took place. Under this directive, Padilla was held at a naval brig in South Carolina without being formally charged with a crime.

Shortly after Bush issued the directive, Padilla filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the Southern District of New York. Later in 2002, Padilla's attorney, Donna Newman, successfully argued before the New York court that Padilla was entitled to speak with her. Padilla ex rel. Newman v. Bush, 233 F. Supp. 2d 564 (S.D.N.Y. 2002). The government had maintained that he would use Newman as a conduit to transmit information to terrorists. Two years later, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed Padilla's petition, ruling that he had improperly filed them in New York. Rumsfeld v. Padilla, 542 U.S. 426, 124 S. Ct. 2711, 159 L. Ed. 2d 513 (2004). Padilla then filed a petition with the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina.

Bush issued his directive based on the Authorization for Use of Military Force Joint Resolution (AUMF), which was approved by Congress on September 18, 2001. Pub. L. No. 107-40, 115 Stat. 224 (2001). This joint resolution provides as follows: "[T]he President is authorized to sue all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future attacks of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations, or persons."

In a decision issued on February 28, 2005, U.S. District Judge Henry F. Floyd Jr. determined that neither the AUMF by Congress nor powers inherently possessed by the president allowed Bush to hold Padilla. Accordingly, the judge ruled that the government must either charge Padilla with a crime or release him. Padilla v. Hanft, 389 F. Supp. 2d 678 (D.S.C. 2005). The government appealed the decision to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which reversed the district court's decision in an opinion issued on September 9. Padilla v. Hanft, 423 F.3d 386 (4th Cir. 2005).

The appellate court reviewed the holding of Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507, 124 S. Ct. 2633, 159 L. Ed. 2d 578 (2004), where the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the detention of a U.S. citizen who fought with Taliban forces in Afghanistan. The Court in a plurality opinion in Hamdi determined that the AUMF authorized the detention of the citizen because the citizen was a combatant of war. The Fourth Circuit decided that like the citizen in Hamdi, Padilla was an enemy combatant and that the result should be the same.

About two months later, the government submitted a motion to the Fourth Circuit, asking the court to allow the government to transfer Padilla to a civilian facility. Padilla had filed a petition for writ of certiorari with the Supreme Court, and the apparent purpose behind the government's motion was to avoid consideration of the issues in the case by the Court. The Fourth Circuit on December 21 denied the government's motion, deciding that the Supreme Court was the appropriate body to decide whether to approve the government's request. Padilla v. Hanft, 432 F.3d 582 (4th Cir. 2005). Early in January, however, the Supreme Court issued an order that granted the government's request to transfer custody to civilian authorities. Padilla was transferred to a federal detention facility in January 2006.

Like Padilla, Moussaoui's criminal case has extended over several years, with a number of delays during the process. A self-proclaimed al Qaeda operative, the government alleged that Moussaoui was part of the original September 11th plot. Had he not been arrested weeks before the attacks on an immigration violation, he would have been the twentieth hijacker, according to the government's case. Much of the prosecution's case was based on evidence from other suspected terrorists who were in the custody of the government. In 2004, the Fourth Circuit issued a complicated ruling about which witnesses that Moussaoui's counsel could depose. United States v. Moussaoui 382 F.3d 453 (4th Cir. 2004).

Moussaoui in April 2005 pleaded guilty to six charges of conspiracy related to his alleged terrorist activities. His trial began in February 2006. Government prosecutors sought the death penalty despite reports that the government had in its possession evidence suggesting that Moussaoui was not part of the September 11th plot. On May 3, 2006, a jury rejected the imposition of the death penalty on Moussaoui, and the court sentenced him to life in prison on the following day.

Two days after he was sentenced, Moussaoui's attorneys filed a motion to withdraw his guilty plea and request a new trial on the question of whether he was guilty as to the charges. The motion said that Moussaoui "did not have any knowledge of and was not a member of the plot to hijack planes and crash them into buildings on September 11." Because the motion was filed after he was sentenced, the court summarily denied the motion on May 8.

Renewal of PATRIOT Act Delayed but Finally Approved

After months of debate and negotiations, Congress in March 2006 authorized the renewal of the USA PATRIOT Act, which was originally passed in 2001 at the urging of President George W. Bush and then-Attorney General John Ashcroft. Many Democrats charged that the statute had been used to allow the government to infringe upon civil liberties of Americans. These concerns caused Congress to delay the act's reauthorization by several months.

In response to the September 11th attacks in 2001, Congress approved the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001, Pub. L. No. 107-56, 115 Stat. 272. The statute, which was more than 100 pages long, enhanced security and surveillance procedures and authorized the use of a number of tools that the government could use to combat terrorists. Congress approved the act by overwhelming majorities in both the House and Senate in October 2001.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) criticized the statute from the time of its enactment. As the government continued implementing programs to combat terrorism, the ACLU became increasingly vocal about the potential for abuse by law enforcement. By 2005, even some conservative groups, such as the American Conservative Union, had begun to question whether the act went too far in terms of impeding individual rights.

Several of the PATRIOT Act's provisions were set to expire on December 31, 2005. Representatives of the Bush administration, including Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Robert Mueller, advocated for renewal of the statute throughout much of 2005. In April, Gonzales and Mueller testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Gonzales testified that the statute "has been an integral part of the federal government's successful prosecution of the war against terrorism" and that "now is not the time to relinquish some of our most effective tools in the fight."

Just days after one of several bombing incidents in London in July 2005, the House approved a bill that made 14 of the Act's 16 provision permanent. The bill would have extended the other two provisions for an additional 10 years. The bill passed by a vote of 257 to 171, with 14 Republicans voting against it and 43 Democrats voting in favor of it. Although support for the bill was largely partisan, several top Democrats, including Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, voted for the legislation.

While the House was considering its proposed legislation in July, the Senate was also considering its own proposal. As the Act's expiration date neared, members of the House and Senate judiciary committees met in joint session to attempt to negotiate. On December 9, the negotiators announced that they had reached a tentative deal, though other members of Congress immediately attacked the new proposal, saying that it still did not adequately protect civil rights. The House approved the conference committee's version on December 15.

Shortly after the conference committee made its announcement, news reports indicated that Bush had secretly authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on American citizens in the months that followed the attacks in 2001. For some members of the Senate, this news signified that the government could not be trusted with all of the powers included in the PATRIOT Act. On December 16, members of the Senate successfully filibustered the bill when only 52 senators voted to cut off debate, eight fewer than necessary to end the filibuster.

The Senate blocking of the proposal left Republicans scrambling to save the act prior to December 31. Senators who opposed passage of the act said that they were willing to compromise. Those who supported the bill, however, said that they were more willing to let the statute expire than to agree to a version that they might view as less effective. After the debate continued for several more days, the Senate agreed to a six-month extension of the PATRIOT Act.

Members of the House did not agree with the length of the extension. Representative James Sensenbrenner, Jr. (R.-Wis.), the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, said that the extension "would have simply allowed the Senate to duck the issue until the last week in June." In a nearly empty chamber on December 22, the House agreed through a voice vote to extend the act until February 3. The Senate approved this extension shortly thereafter.

Negotiation continued during January and February in 2006. Most of the debate centered on the protection of certain civil liberties. At a minimum, critics wanted to limit the government's access to library and business records. Unable to reach a compromise by the February 3 deadline, the House and Senate again agreed to an extension, this time through March 10. In both chambers, negotiators attempted to add procedural safeguards that would protect civil liberties, including the allowance of court challenges to some requests for information by the government.

On March 1, the Senate approved an amended bill that included many of these procedural safeguards by a vote of 89 to 10. About a week later, the House agreed to the proposals by a vote of 280 to 138. Supporters for the final legislation noted that negotiators had added several provisions that were designed to ensure that civil liberties would not be abused. Critics, on the other hand, continued to question whether the government could be trusted with the tools provided for in the statute. Bush signed the bill on March 9.

Millennium Bomber Sentenced

Ahmed Ressam, the Algerian man who was convicted of attempting to blow up the Los Angeles airport at the turn of the millennium, was sentenced in July 2005 to 22 years in prison.

Ressam, who came to be referred to as the "Millennium Bomber," received a lighter sentence than the prosecutors had hoped for because he had helped the federal government as an informant during the years since his arrest. However, Ressam became less cooperative in 2003, and his reluctance to talk to investigators has hamstrung cases against two individuals who have been accused of conspiring with him in the Los Angeles airport bombing plot. The sentencing for Ressam had been scheduled for April of 2005, but it was postponed in the hope of eliciting further cooperation. U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour said he had hoped that Ressam would testify against Samir Ait Mohamed and Abu Doha, who were waiting to be extradited from Canada and Britain, respectively, and who had also been charged in the airport bombing plot.

Among other useful information, Ressam supplied details that led to the capture of poten-tial bomber Richard Reid, who attempted to blow up an American Airlines flight in 2001 with a bomb secreted in his shoe.

The Associated Press quoted public defender Thomas Hillier as saying that the government sentence did not sufficiently account for Ressam's cooperation. "It is a flat fact that law enforcement, the public, and public safety have benefited in countless ways" as a result of Ressam's cooperation with federal investigators, he said.

Ressam has reportedly provided detailed information about al-Qaeda terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and has helped U.S. authorities identify more than 100 individuals with suspected links to al-Qaeda.

U.S. customs agents arrested Ressam in 1999, when he was driving a car filled with bomb-making materials off a ferry that had arrived in Port Angeles from British Columbia.

The prosecutors had asked for a 35-year sentence, and lawyers for Ressam had asked for 12 and a half years. The attorneys for Ressam have said that he is willing to cooperate again and that his valuable help in the past justifies a "substantial reduction" in his sentence.

The government had offered a 27-year sentence, which Ressam accepted in exchange for cooperation. Although defense lawyers have said that the defense felt manipulated by the twenty-seven-year offer, government prosecutors said that Ressam knew that he would be unlikely to receive a shorter sentence, given that had been convicted of nine federal counts related to the Los Angeles airport bombing attempt. In August 2005, the government appealed and requested a longer prison term, but the sentence had not been changed by early 2006. The prosecutors justified their request by arguing that when Ressam stopped cooperating, he became eligible for a harsher sentence that would start at 65 years.