Judges? We don't need no damn judges...we have the Executive

CLICK ON THE TITLE TO READ ABOUT THE LATEST ATTEMPT BY OUR JUDICIARY TO DO AWAY WITH JUDICIAL OVERSIGHT...........

Speaking of Surviving......

I guess we must still wait for the punchline but it seems that Appellate Court Judge Bybee is claiming that when he was head of the Office of Legal Counsel he did not give approval for "certain" torture techniques used . We will have to wait to see what happens next as this opens the door for prosecution (under the theory adoped by our current and former administrations) for those accused of committing these war crimes. To clarify: these actions were always illegal, but both Bush and Obama claimed that they wouldn't go after individuals because they had approval from the executive for these war crimes...now Bybee is saying "NO, there was no approval."

hmmm. The question is whether Bybee is throwing the other torturers under the bus to save himself? Which in turn brings us to the other question....who will throw Bybee under the bus...?

stay tuned.. and click here for the story.

RIP Charly Gittings

During the night my friend and the friend of many of us, Charly Gittings, died. He was diagnosed with lung cancer just about a year ago and he fought the good fight as long as he could. He asked me, and his many other friends, to carry on certain battles: to keep his project alive "the project to enforce the Geneva Conventions" and to do our best to bring our war criminals to justice. I made the promise to him that I would do everything I could to make sure our war criminals were prosecuted....and I will. I hope others will work on finding a home for his Project.

I would like to share some of the thoughts from his friends with you, I hope they do not mind:

"Our loss is also the loss of the world; peace, justice and honor will be just a bit further away from our grasp";

"If I were to do an eulogy for Charles Gittings, I would say he was a stubborn, obstinate—even prickly—man who knew his duty and always performed it faithfully. In my personal experience, he managed to sway many people, among them military officers, to accept his point of view. He contributed a great deal to our understanding of war crimes, he documented his findings meticulously and he ended up being in the right. I can't think of a better epitaph. This man made a difference";

"I join in lamenting the loss of a sweet-tempered, hard-working, gentle giant who never tired of seeking rights for those that so many sunshine patriots despise.

I am so sorry to lose Charly";

"It fell to me, in the last year of a life that began in 1914
that Charlie gave me the rare honor of allowing me to serve as his attorney of record in SCOTUS in the KIYEMBA .
Until then I had admired his Project from afar, with a occasional grumble at the failure of the elite of the American Society of International Law to have founded a
project to enforce the Charter of the United Nations, the terms of which are under our Constitution THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND";

"On a rainy evening sadly comes a long expected visit. but with it bittersweetly, the balm of these remembrances.

Five years ago I wandered into a Guantanamo case, filed a motion, and about ten seconds after it hit Pacer, had the lion heart at my ear. On that shining day when we grasped victory, and on the dark ones when the Circuit snatched it back, he was there. He never tired. I can hear him still.

Well done, thou good and faithful servant -- Atque in perpetuum, frater, ave atque vale."

TO read Charly's biography click here.

The talking dog has more here.

And to check out the Charly Gittings memorial blog click here.....

And so Charly, rest in peace and please know that your friends that will continue to do their best to prosecute those who have violated our laws.

Andy Worthington updates....

Andy has updated his four-part definitive Guantanamo prisoner list, bringing the project up-to-date with new links to the last six months of habeas results, releases (just 17), torture revelations and the ongoing failure of the Obama administration to close the prison.

Click on the title for more.........

Andy has also completed the most recent of six lists providing links to all his articles in chronological order, covering Jan-Jun 2010 (the lists start in May 2007), which is a useful resource as well:

http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2010/07/10/the-guantanamo-files-an-archive-of-articles-part-six-january-to-june-2010/

Detainee Transfer Announced by Pentagon

This is the official announcement:

The Department of Defense announced today the transfer of one detainee from the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to the Government of Yemen.

On May 26, 2010, a U.S. District Court ordered the release of Mohammed Odaini from custody at Guantanamo Bay. As a result, the Department of Defense has transferred him to his native country. In accordance with Congressionally-mandated reporting requirements, the administration informed Congress of its intent to transfer Odaini at least 15 days before his transfer.

The suspension of Yemeni repatriations from Guantanamo remains in effect due to the security situation that exists there. However, the Administration respects the decisions of U.S. federal courts, which ordered the release of Odaini. As with all transfers, the U.S. Government will work with the Yemeni Government to the fullest extent possible to implement appropriate security measures.

Since 2002, more than 595 detainees have departed Guantanamo Bay for other destinations, including Albania, Algeria, Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Belgium, Bermuda, Chad, Denmark, Egypt, Georgia, France, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Pakistan, Palau, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Somalia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom and Yemen.

Today, 180 detainees remain at Guantanamo Bay.

Andrew Napolitano: Bush and Cheney Should Have Been Indicted for Torturing, for Spying and Arresting Without Warrants

By Heather Monday Jul 12, 2010 4:00pm

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Well, this is something you don't see every day. Ralph Nader hosted this interview segment with Fox News' Judge Andrew Napolitano and discussed his book, Lies the Government Told You. I'm surprised the judge is going to be allowed on Fox after making the statements he did about Bush and Cheney during the interview.

Nader: What about the more serious violations of habeas corpus. You know after 9-11 Bush rounded up thousands of them, Americans, many of them Muslim Americans or Arabic Americans and they were thrown in jail without charges, they didn't have lawyers, some of them were pretty mistreated in New York City. You know they were all released eventually.

Napolitano: Correct.

Nader: Is that what you mean also about throwing people in jail without charges violating habeas corpus?

Napolitano: Well that is so obviously a violation of the natural law, the natural right to be brought before a neutral arbiter within moments of the government taking your freedom away from you. And the Constitution itself, as the Supreme Court in the Boumediene case pretty much said, wherever the government goes, the Constitution goes with it and wherever the Constitution goes are the rights of the Constitution as a guarantee and habeas corpus cannot be suspended by the president ever. It can only be suspended by the Congress in times of rebellion which in read Milligan says meaning rebellion of such magnitude that judges can't get into their court houses. That has not happened in American history.

So what President Bush did with the suspension of habeas corpus, with the whole concept of Guantanamo Bay, with the whole idea that he could avoid and evade federal laws, treaties, federal judges and the Constitution was blatantly unconstitutional and is some cases criminal.

Nader: What's the sanction for President Bush and Vice President Cheney?

Napolitano: There's been no sanction except what history will say about them.

Nader: What should be the sanctions?

Napolitano: They should have been indicted. They absolutely should have been indicted for torturing, for spying, for arresting without warrants. I'd like to say they should be indicted for lying but believe it or not, unless you're under oath, lying is not a crime. At least not an indictable crime. It's a moral crime.

Nader: So you think George W. Bush and Dick Cheney should even though they've left office, they haven't escaped the criminal laws, they should be indicted and prosecuted?

Napolitano: The evidence in this book and in others, our colleague the great Vincent Bugliosi has amassed an incredible amount of evidence. The purpose of this book was not to amass that evidence but I do discuss it, is overwhelming when you compare it to the level of evidence required for a normal indictment that George W. Bush as President and Dick Cheney as Vice President participated in criminal conspiracies to violate the federal law and the guaranteed civil liberties of hundreds, maybe thousands of human beings.

They go on to discuss how these crimes have gone on unpunished and how the practices have continued under Obama and that as long as our citizens are willing to accept government deception and as long as the Justice Department and the lawyers in this country are not going to pursue these cases in court it's never going to stop. It's a topic that our media is happy to help brush under the rug as well.

UPDATE: If you would like to watch the entire hour long interview from Book TV, C-SPAN has it available in their video library here.

Omar Khadr speaks out.....

Click on the title for Carol Rosenberg's latest on Omar Khadr.

Emptywheel has more here.

Yes. not only will we survive but we will make it right....

Click on the title for more..........

Carol: Welcome back to the Gitmo beat!

The Military has decided not to illegally ban one of the top Gitmo reporters who reports on all things Gitmo.

Click on the title for the story from the Miami Harold about the reinstatement of Carol Rosenberg.

Click here for a further discussion from emptywheel.

CAROL, WE ARE VERY HAPPY YOU WILL BE BACK AT GITMO, keep up the good work.

Another Habeas Win- UPDATED

It was just pointed out to me that the scorecard now reads 37-13...the Government has one less win because of the Circuit Court's reversal in Bensayah (discussed here).

Tip of the hat to Roger Fitch.

You Can Run But You Cannot Hide (updated)

Last month I reported on the complaint filed against James Elmer Mitchell, one of the architects of the CIA torture program. I am happy to report that the American Psychological Assn has now filed a letter supporting the complaint against Dr. James Mitchell. I hope to have a link to that letter shortly.

On a separate but related note the Center for Justice and Accountability filed a complaint against one of the other masterminds of the CIA torture program Dr. John Leso. Details here.

Thank You PEGS for the link.

Another Habeas Win

Today Judge Friedman issued an order granting the writ to Yemeni Hussain Salem Mohammad Almerfedi, ISN 1015. The merits hearing in his case occurred on March 3-5, 2010. Judge Friedman ordered that an unclassified version of his opinion is to be provided to him by July 22.

The scorecard is now 37 habeas wins, 14 losses.

Congrats to Brian E. Foster and the Covington team.

Plea deal for Gitmo detainee

Yesterday the military announced that it reached a plea deal with one of the Guantanamo detainees. When I read the announcement I knew it stunk to high heaven but it wasn't until last night that I went and read as much as I could find on Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi....

I don't have time to link to the NY Times database right now but you can go to it yourself and paste in his name and do a search....probably wikipedia has links too. It is shameful that this is an example of what our government calls a "war crime."

Roger Fitch at Justian has more here.

Canadian Court coming through for Khadr?

I will try to have a link to this decision later today but the Federal Court of Canada issued an Order yesterday which suggests that they may be getting close to restoring an earlier order requiring the Government of Canada to request Omar Khadr's repatriation from gtmo....stay tuned.

Thanks to PEGC we now have a link to the decision. CLICK ON THE TITLE

Happy 4th continued....