Khalid Sheikh Mohammed To Be Tried In Open Court in New York

from The Last Crusade h/t Michael Travis

PRESIDENT OBAMA TRANSFORMS TERRORISTS INTO U.S. CITIZENS

Constitution Right Granted to Terrorists

No Constitutional Rights For Red-Blooded Americans
by
thelastcrusade.org

Welcome to the Islamic America of Barack Hussein Obama,

Self-proclaimed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other Guantanamo Bay detainees have been granted full rights and protection under the U.S. Constitution.

They will be sent to New York to face trial in a civilian federal court, an Obama administration official announced today.

Under the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, Mr. Mohammed and the other “alleged” terrorists will have the right to a speedy trial, the right to publicly paid counsel, the right to immediate access to all government evidence – - including the most sensitive intelligent files – - that can be used against him, the right to remain silent, the right to obtain witnesses in his favor, the right of protection against self incrimination, and the right to participate in jury selection.

The trial is expected to cost over $100 million and may drag on for many years.

Thanks to President Obama’s decision, Mr. Mohammed will have a platform to reach out to radical Islamists throughout the world to join in the holy war against the United States and the opportunity to disseminate highly confidential government information to every jihadist in creation.

This information is expected to produce a dire impact on the U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and to create a new wave of attacks against the American people.

While Mr. Mohammed has obtained all the rights and privileges of a U.S. citizen, such rights and privileges are being denied to real red-blooded American citizens.

Dr. Paul L. Williams, noted author and journalist, is now being dragged into a Canadian court of law and stripped of his Constitutional rights for statements he made from his home in Pennsylvania – - statements that are well within the limits of American libel laws.

Williams was quoted as saying: “I want my rights back! Obama has handed them [Constitutional Rights] to an Islamic terrorist.”

Yet neither the American Civil Liberties Union nor the American Center for Law and Justice has come to the defense of Dr. Williams.

By attempting to warn the American people of a terror threat, he is being treated as a terrorist.

And Mr. Mohammed, himself a terrorist, is being treated as a privileged citizen, with rights and status usually reserved for politicians and Wall St. bankers.

Without confirming details of the decision, President Barack Obama said it was a legal and national security matter. “I am absolutely convinced that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be subjected to the most exacting demands of justice,” Obama said at a joint news conference in Tokyo with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama.

Bringing Mr. Mohammed and his terrorist friends to U.S. soil to face trial represents a key step in Mr. Obama’s plan to close the terror suspect detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The president initially planned to close the detention center by Jan. 22, but the administration is no longer expected to meet that deadline.

It is also a major legal and political test of Obama’s overall approach to terrorism. If the case suffers legal setbacks, the administration will face second-guessing from those who never wanted it in a civilian courtroom. And if lawmakers get upset about terrorists being brought to their home regions, they may fight back against other parts of Obama’s agenda.

“This is definitely a seismic shift in how we’re approaching the war on al-Qaida,” said Glenn Sulmasy, a law professor at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy who has written a book on national security justice. “It’s certainly surprising that the five masterminds, if you will, of the attacks on the United States will be tried in traditional, open federal courts.”

The New York case may force the court system to confront a host of difficult legal issues surrounding counterterrorism programs begun after the 2001 attacks, including interrogation techniques, including water-boarding, that were used on some of the suspects while in CIA custody.

Mr, Mohammed was subjected to water-boarding or simulated drowning 183 times in 2003.

Holder will also announce that five other detainees, including a major suspect in the bombing of the USS Cole, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, will face justice before a military commission, the official said.

Attorney General Eric Holder has decided the case of the five Sept. 11 suspects should be handled by prosecutors working in the Southern District of New York, which has held a number of major terrorism trials in recent decades at a courthouse in lower Manhattan, just blocks from where the World Trade Center towers tumbled on Sept. 11, 2001.

Some members of Congress have fought any effort to bring Guantanamo Bay detainees to trial in the United States, saying it would be too dangerous for nearby civilians.

The Obama administration has defended the planned trials, saying many terrorists have been safely tried, convicted, and imprisoned in the United States, including the 1993 World Trade Center bomber, Ramzi Yousef.

Mohammed and the four others — Waleed bin Attash, Ramzi Binalshibh, Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi and Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali — are accused of orchestrating the attacks that killed 2,973 people on Sept. 11.

Mohammed admitted to interrogators that he was the mastermind of the attacks — he allegedly proposed the concept to Osama bin Laden as early as 1996, obtained funding for the attacks from bin Laden, oversaw the operation and trained the hijackers in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The charges against the others are as follows:

— Bin Attash, a Yemeni, allegedly ran an al-Qaida training camp in Logar, Afghanistan, where two of the 19 hijackers were trained. Bin Attash is believed to have been bin Laden’s bodyguard. Authorities say bin Laden selected him as a hijacker, but he was prevented from participating when he was briefly detained in Yemen in early 2001.

— Binalshibh, a Yemeni, allegedly helped find flight schools for the hijackers, helped them enter the United States and assisted with financing the operation. He allegedly was selected to be a hijacker and made a “martyr video” in preparation for the operation, but was unable to get a U.S. visa. He also is believed to be a lead operative for a foiled plot to crash aircraft into London’s Heathrow Airport.

— Ali allegedly helped nine of the hijackers travel to the United States and sent them $120,000 for expenses and flight training. He is believed to have served as a key lieutenant to Mohammed in Pakistan. He was born in Pakistan and raised in Kuwait.

— Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi, a Saudi, allegedly helped the hijackers with money, western clothing, traveler’s checks and credit cards. Al-Hawsawi testified in the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, saying he had seen Moussaoui at an al-Qaida guesthouse in Kandahar, Afghanistan, in early 2001, but was never introduced to him or conducted operations with him.

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