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The Spectacle Blog
Former Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who as a judge presided over a trial stemming from the first attack on the World Trade Center, on Friday warned that the Obama administration’s decision to bring Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to New York, along with three other terrorist detainees, to stand trial in a civilian court, reflected a pre-9/11 mindset that viewed terrorism as a simple criminal matter.
Speaking at the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention, Mukasey described the move, as “a decision I consider not only unwise, but based on a refusal to face the fact that what we are involved with here is a war with people who follow a religiously-based ideology that calls on them to kill us, and to return instead to the mindset that prevailed before Sept. 11 that acts like the first World Trade Center bombing, the attacks on our embassies in Africa and other such acts can and should be treated as conventional crimes and tried in conventional courts.”
Describing a pattern of decisions made since the the Obama administration pledged in January to close Guantanamo Bay prison within a year, Mukasey said that, “What’s followed has seemed in many instances to be a system in which policy is fashioned to fit and proceed rhetoric rather than being thought out in advance with arguments then formulated in support of it.”
He noted that Congress already authorized the trial of detainees through military commissions, and that those trials would have already been underway.
“Now, that procedure is to be short-circuited — actually, long-circuited would be more accurate — so that they could be brought to this country and tried in a civilian court,” he said. “We should all be aware that those cases which were scheduled to have already begun now have to start from scratch.”
The difficulty of trying terror suspects through civilian courts, he said, is that the discovery process, the public presentation of evidence, and other elements of a trial “could turn a criminal proceeding into a cornucopia of information for those still at large and a circus for those in custody.”
He pointed out that when capturing the enemy combatants, pieces of information “were not gathered, nor was evidence gathered, on the assumption that they would be presented in a federal court.”
There would also be tremendous security issues involved with making sure that courthouses, jails, the judge and jury, were all safe.
“It would take a whole lot more credulousness than I have available to be optimistic about the outcome of this latest experiment,” Mukasey said at the conclusion of his formal remarks.
During a question and answer session that followed, Mukasey was asked if he felt the jails in New York were secure enough to make sure terrorists would not escape, but he said that wasn’t really the issue.
“If you ask the wrong question, you’re sure to get the wrong answer,” Mukasey responded. “Of course it’s secure. They’re not going to escape. The question is not whether they’re going to escape, the question is whether not only that facility, but the city at large will then become the focus for mischief in the form of murder by adherents of KSM, whether this raises the odds that it will. And I would suggest to you that it raises them very high. It is also whether the proceeding, even assuming that it goes forward within the lifetime of anybody in this room, is one where confidential information is able to be kept confidential, and a trial is able to proceed in an orderly way.”
He later added that, “to the extent that they are within prisons, they are a threat there as well. Any of these people would be a virtually totemic figure in a prison.” He argued that “shoe bomber” Richard Reid’s success in challenging his solitary confinement shows that there’s no guaruntee that convicted terrorists would stay isolated from the rest of the prison population.
Asked about Attorney General Eric Holder’s statement that he was confident that the defendents wouldn’t be able to get off on a legal technicality, Mukasey replied that while he doesn’t have access to the same information as Holder, “Betting the farm on the outcome of that process always involves risk.”
While he was adamantly opposed to today’s decision, Mukasey said that if Mohammed and other members of Al Qaeda had to be tried in civilian courts, no venue is better equipped to handle it than the Southern District of New York, where he served as a judge. He also said he was confident in the jury selection process.
“They don’t have to have been comatose over the past 10 years to serve on a jury,” he explained. “What they have to be able to do is to promise that they will decide the case based only on the evidence presented in the courtroom and not what they hear outside, and there has to be good reason to believe that they could fulfill that promise. And jurors like that can be found. That part of the process I have great faith in. It’s the rest of it that worries me.”
View all comments (64) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Philip Klein
http://spectator.org/blog/2009/11/13/mukasey-blasts-pre-911-mentail
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Amor de Cosmos| 11.13.09 @ 5:33PM
I keep wondering if this selection of these persons for trials and leaving others to military commissions will be able to withstand constitutional scrutiny as "due process".
Moreover, this exercise will undoubtedly expose state secrets, methods, put enhanced interrogation in the dock, and a whole host of war on terror activities and actions for what purposes? None benign I can appreciate at the moment.
Change you can believe in.
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 5:56PM
Hot Air » Blog Archive » Bush AG Mukasey rips Obama over KSM decision links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 6:25PM
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four the four other GITMO detainees transfered to New York links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Ken(Old Texican)| 11.13.09 @ 6:29PM
I swear, this is almost enough to make me a conspiracy nut!
Heh.
Is this yet another matador's cape to wave at us as a distraction from other sinister plans for us?
Whatever the case, it is absolutely nuts!
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 6:53PM
Bush AG Mukasey rips Obama over KSM decision | Trem's News Rush links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
BD57| 11.13.09 @ 9:24PM
Given the potential for compromising national security through discovery and the likelihood that the defense will seek to put America (actually, the Bush Administration - at least, that's what the New York Times & the rest of the MSM echo chamber will say) on trial, it's hard to see how this exercise benefits America.
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 10:04PM
KSM to be tried in NYC for 9/11 plot « Wellsy's World links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 10:15PM
Michelle Malkin » Bombshell: Obama bringing KSM to NYC for trial; former Bush AG Muka links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 10:49PM
Smack Down of Obama Administration on KSM Trial Decision : Stop The ACLU links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.13.09 @ 10:59PM
Is the President Committing Political Suicide with KBH? links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 12:42AM
Criminally stupid | Hoystory links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 12:43AM
Obama Grants Arch Terrorist KSM’s Fondest Wish! links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 1:00AM
The administration’s KSM decision — Michael Mukasey’s take | America Watches Obama links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Phil| 11.14.09 @ 1:08AM
Sorry, but the opening paragraph negates every subsequent one.
The only way this could sound any more insane would be if that's the way he introduced himself in this interview:
"Hi, I'm the guy who presided over a successful criminal court conviction of al Qaeda members in the first WTC attack and I've got the following opinion on repeating that for the second attack where nobody has yet been convicted...."
This too is an insane statement:
" The difficulty of trying terror suspects through civilian courts, he said, is that the discovery process, the public presentation of evidence ... a cornucopia of information for those still at large and a circus for those in custody.” "
Well yeah, that would be the case if someone repealed the state secrets provisions which are specifically designed to address this. This decision would be at the behest of the Obama administration who's used these more frequently than Bush did.
But that's not why it's insane. It's insane because the man making this warning is the judge from the first WTC attack. You're the reason I knew bin Laden's sat phone number prior to 9/11 and he knew that was being monitored. And now YOU would like to warn US about a WTC trial leaking sensitive information would you??????
Ken (Old Texican)| 11.14.09 @ 8:55AM
Hi Phil
...Perhaps the judge learned from that last mistake?
SC Mike| 11.14.09 @ 6:50PM
Phil - Are you asserting that Mukasey was the judge during the first WTC bombing trial and that he somehow disclosed intercepts of bin Laden’s satellite phone?
Judge Kevin Thomas Duffy presided over that trial.
And while bin Laden did stop using one sat phone around the time of the embassy bombing, the reason for that is not clear and he did start using another sat phone later.
Please clarify, add links, or retract.
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 1:13AM
I Think It’s Official « Buttle’s World links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 7:37AM
Back to September 10th » Blogs For Victory links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 8:35AM
Roger’s Rules » Where are the Purple Hearts? Some Truths About Fort Hood links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Kerry | 11.14.09 @ 8:44AM
This will end badly. Imagine riots and rock throwing to the third power like the anarchist-anti-globalist nonsense in Seattle or St. Paul. Code Pinkjihad with combustible liquids in a city where the state has disarmed its citizens. Imagine the backlash against whom when some lower level KSM wannabe freed by some legal technicality loophole, (maybe someone didn't fully explain the meaning of the word 'is'), brings the religion of "The slaughter of the innocents" to a daycare in Queens. If they want to put these excrementals on trial, and this presupposes some 'right to trial', then I suggest they be tried for treason. "But, but, but, you say, they can't be tried for treason, they are not citizens!" " Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter." "IHS"
Yosemti Sam| 11.14.09 @ 10:46AM
Fitting -yeah, fitting, that NYC aka Babylon of the
America East should 'entertain' a circus of judiciary proceedings to hold 'accountable' the prima facie case of concrete premeditating murderous servant-minded Islam0fascism. Is there some ideological masochism at 'play' from
BHO and minion DOJ head?
LOL.
There is an counter to this tragi-comedy from BHOs' puppeteered DOJ - the third Constitutional
branch of the makeup of our America: the
SCOTUS. Why not a blizzard of Constitutional
challenges to STOP this egregious display of
liberal masturbatory activism to screw Americas'
image.
philfl63| 11.14.09 @ 12:41PM
Yes, I am going to curse again, because civil comments just do not seem appropriate. First of all, it has been eight F**KING years since 9-11. What was our government (charged with defending us from our enemies) waiting for? Were they hoping these terrorists would die of old age? I was in Iraq when they tried Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein and his fellow accused harangued the court, threatened the judges, and disrupted the proceedings. It took us three years just to bring him to trial in the Iraqi courts. It then took time for him to be executed. I do not know why the Bush administration did not try these mutants via military tribunals. They would have been found guilty and executed by now. We managed to do that just fine with those German saboteurs during WWII. Their case even received review from the Supreme Court. Oh, I forgot, today our political leadership are a bunch of whiny pu**ies worried about political correctness and offending poor oppressed people of color.
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 2:03PM
What could go wrong? « Public Secrets links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Nick| 11.14.09 @ 7:06PM
It was also the trial of the World Trade Center bombers that explained the engineering of the buildings, and what it would take to bring them down.
The trial exposed the towers' weaknesses and led to 9/11.
Thanks, Bubba the pervert.
These are UNLAWFUL ENEMY COMBATANTS. And these are not felonies. These are WAR CRIMES. Committed by people that have never been recognized to legally wage war. And they are waging war against civilians, also illegal.
This is why terrorists do not belong in federal criminal courts. They belong where unlawful combatants have always been tried, military tribunals.
Pingback| 11.14.09 @ 10:10PM
“Lets not jump to conclusions…” Is the mood changing? — Winds Of Jihad By SheikYerMam links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Tom Human| 11.15.09 @ 12:11AM
I'm always amazed how cowardly you people are. Exactly what are you expecting to happen? They're going to break their handcuffs and tear down the Empire State Building?
These guys have been waterboarded hundreds of times. They've been in jail for almost ten years and we assume the usual techniques we know so well from Guantanamo have been applied. I'd be impressed if these guys could walk down a street without help by this point. And there will be a zillion guards and police officers - the US certainly doesn't have a shortage of aggressive people with uniforms and guns.
What are you so frightened of?
"And they are waging war against civilians, also illegal."
The US has been waging war against civilians pretty well continuously for over 50 years. Consider how many tens of thousands of completely innocent people were killed in the bombing of Cambodia and Laos - countries that the US has never been at war with. At least two million died in Vietnam - what did the Vietnamese ever do to the US? Hundreds of thousands are dead in Iraq - what the Iraq ever do the US?
Face it, you guys can dish it out but you can't take it. If you had any guts you'd give these people a fair trial.
Nick| 11.15.09 @ 12:27PM
Tom Sub-Human,
It is you stinking liberals who are cowards. You spit on our brave Viet Nam veterans and called them "baby killers". You cut-off military aid to South Viet Nam so you could help your commie buddies.
And now you want to lick the boots of the terrorists because you are afraid if we punish them, they will attack. Using lefty logic, the opposite is true, i.e., not punishing them will keep us safe. What moronic thinking.
Stop using the left's inflated casualty figures, it makes you look foolish. The Cambodians and Laotians wanted us to bomb the N.V.A., who were illegally using their countries as sanctuaries.
Martin Timothy | 11.15.09 @ 12:38AM
Michael B. Mukasey, from The Israeli Connection to 911..
[URL]http://jewishcrimenetworkdid911.blogspot.com/#PPM[/URL]
This Orthodox Jewish judge oversaw the litigation between Larry Silverstein and insurance companies after 9/11, Silverstein was awarded billions, Mukasey prevented full inquiry into the Five Dancing Israelis incident who were arrested in connection with 9/11, and played a role in their release. He was later appointed attorney general by President Bush, he defended the patriot act, and supports torture policies.
Mukasey is the one who should be charged and questioned under oath, Jews carried out the attacks, then blamed and brought war to the innocent via their ownership of all the media conglomerates world wide, which disseminated misleading information via heavily edited and downright fraudulent television news footage.
Future proceedings must differ from the present norm of extracting incriminating evidence by way of torture, while totally ignoring real evidence, deliberately misleading or false testimony is punished to the maximum discretion of the court, which means in a capital case perjury or contempt of court is punished by hanging!
The 911 investigation is a capital case.. when Mr Mukasey is brought to the stand he must reveal his part in the plot to the fullest of his knowledge, his video taped testimony without torture or mistreatment, but by summons and open court proceedings will be inserted on the investigation data base open website, then he will either go to trial by jury or seek the mercy of the court.
Nick| 11.15.09 @ 4:43PM
Go away anti-Semite pig!
Pingback| 11.15.09 @ 6:19AM
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