From The Courts
These are two interesting court cases worth watching: Guantanamo Bay, detainees being held in Cuba, have won an appellate decision to be charged in a court and given access to lawyers and the American legal system. On Thursday, a different court, this time, The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 in New York to give "the government 30 days to send suspected 'dirty bomber' Jose Padilla to the civilian justice system, or else release him outright," the Wall Street Journal reports. The court said Padilla's treatment "violated a 1971 law enacted specifically to help avoid situations similar to the World War II internment of Japanese-Americans." via The Daily Briefing. These decisions strike strong blows to the strong arm tactics of Rumsfeld and company in Washington and critics say the decision will weaken our ability to fight terror around the world. However I can only believe that the only way we can wield any kind of justice is to do so out in the open, in front of everyone. Justice mustn't be administered in private. And holding the "enemy combatants" in Cuba without a trial or access to attorneys isn't justice. From the Ninth Circuit Court ruling: ""We simply cannot accept the government's position that the executive branch possesses the unchecked authority to imprison indefinitely any persons, foreign citizens included . . . without permitting such prisoners recourse of any kind to any judicial forum,"Judge Steven Reinhardt said in the ruling, joined by one other judge. Many legal experts expect the Guantanamo Bay decision to be overruled by a broader Supreme Court ruling expected in the summer of 2004. The Ninth Circuit court of appeals is much more liberal in its interpretation of the law than other appellate courts and many legal watchers expect this decision will be overturned by a more conservative bench.
posted by majikwah @ 12/20/2003 02:26:00 PM
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