U.S. Government plans to use evidence from torture in death penalty case
Vincent Warren, Executive Director, The Center for Constitutional Rights 11 February 2008
Today Military commission charges were handed down that seek the
death penalty against CCR’s client Guantánamo detainee Mohammed al
Qahtani.
No military commission against Mr. Al Qahtani will ever achieve
justice. Instead, it will deteriorate into a controversy over secret
trials and the United States’ well-documented torture of Mr. al Qahtani
during interrogations at Guantánamo.
Read more about Al Qahtani’s Torture
For the past six years, the United States government has refused to
conduct traditional criminal trials or courts martial against
Guantanamo detainees suspected of wrongdoing.
Instead, the military commissions at Guantanamo allow secret evidence,
hearsay evidence, and evidence obtained through torture. They are
unlawful, unconstitutional, and a perversion of justice.
Read more about military comissions
Now the government is seeking to execute people based on this
utterly unreliable and tainted evidence: it is difficult to imagine a
more morally reprehensible system. Executions based on secret trials
and torture evidence belong to another century. These barbaric sham
proceedings will likely to inflame the controversy surrounding
Guantanamo and draw the condemnation of even our allies.
Career military officers have already resigned because they could not
stomach participating in a military commission system that goes against
every principle of justice, due process and the rule of law. In
particular, they were opposed to precisely the kinds of issues that
will be the focus of Mr. al Qahtani’s commission – the United States’
use of torture and subsequent efforts to hide the criminal conduct of
U.S. personnel.
Mr. al Qahtani may be the one charged today, but it is the illegality
of his interrogation under torture that will be tried in the
commission. Regardless of the results, no one will ever have confidence
in the outcome of these military commissions.
Read more about military comissions
The United States has nothing legitimate to gain from prosecuting
prisoners in military commissions at Guantanamo and a great deal to
lose.
What kind of a nation have we become that we would rely on torture
evidence, secret trials and an untested and deeply flawed system to
impose the death penalty?
Our nation must abandon the failed experiment at Guantanamo. If the
administration believes Mr. Al Qahtani has committed a crime, he should
be charged and tried in a lawful proceeding worthy of our country.