The Christian Science Monitor May 24, 12:13 PM EDT
US residents in military brigs? Govt says it's war
By MATT APUZZO Associated Press Writer
WA****NGTON (AP) -- If his cell were at Guantanamo Bay, the
prisoner would be just one of hundreds of suspected terrorists
detained offshore, where the U.S. says the Constitution does
not apply.
But Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri is a U.S. resident being held in
a South Carolina military brig; he is the only enemy combatant
held on U.S. soil. That makes his case very different.
Al-Marri's capture six years ago might be the Bush
administration's biggest domestic counterterrorism success
story. Authorities say he was an al-Qaida sleeper agent living
in middle America, researching poisonous g***** and plotting a
cyberattack.
To justify holding him, the government claimed a broad
interpretation of the president's wartime powers, one that
goes beyond warrantless wiretapping or monitoring banking
transactions. Government lawyers told federal judges that the
president can send the military into any U.S. neighborhood,
capture a citizen and hold him in prison without charge,
indefinitely.
There is little middle ground between the two sides in al-
Marri's case, which is before a federal appeals court in
Virginia. The government says the president needs this power
to keep the nation safe. Al-Marri's lawyers say that as long
as the president can detain anyone he wants, nobody is safe.
---
A Qatari national, al-Marri came to the U.S. with his wife and
five children on Sept. 10, 2001 - one day before the terrorist
attacks in New York and Wa****ngton. He arrived on a student
visa seeking a master's degree in computer science from
Bradley University, a small private school in Peoria, Ill.
The government says he had other plans.
According to court do***ents citing multiple intelligence
sources, al-Marri spent months in al-Qaida training camps
during the late 1990s and was schooled in the science of
poisons. The summer before al-Marri left for the United
States, he allegedly met with Osama bin Laden and Sept. 11
mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The two al-Qaida leaders
decided al-Marri would make a perfect sleeper agent and rushed
him into the U.S. before Sept. 11, the government says.
A computer specialist, al-Marri was ordered to wreak havoc on
the U.S. banking system and serve as a liaison for other al-
Qaida operatives entering this country, according to a court
do***ent filed by Jeffrey Rapp, a senior member of the Defense
Intelligence Agency.
According to Rapp, al-Marri received up to $13,000 for his
trip, plus money to buy a laptop, courtesy of Mustafa Ahmad
al-Hawsawi, who is suspected of helping finance the Sept. 11
attacks.
A week after the attacks, Congress unanimously passed the
Authorization for Use of Military Force. It gave President
Bush the power to "use all necessary and appropriate force"
against anyone involved in planning, aiding or carrying out
the attacks.
The FBI interviewed al-Marri that October and arrested him in
December as part of the Sept. 11 investigation. He rarely had
been attending cl***** and was failing in school, the
government said.
When investigators looked through his computer files, they
found information on industrial chemical suppliers, sermons by
bin Laden, how-to guides for making hydrogen cyanide and
information about chemicals labeled "immediately dangerous to
life or health," according to Rapp's court filing. Phone calls
and e-mails linked al-Marri to senior al-Qaida leaders.
In early 2003, he was indicted on charges of credit card fraud
and lying to the FBI. Like anyone else in the country, he had
constitutional rights. He could question government witnesses,
refuse to testify and retain a lawyer.
On June 23, 2003, Bush declared al-Marri an enemy combatant,
which stripped him of those rights. Bush wrote that al-Marri
possessed intelligence vital to protect national security. In
his jail cell in Peoria, however, he could refuse to speak
with investigators.
A military brig allowed more options. Free from the
constraints of civilian law, the military could interrogate
al-Marri without a lawyer, detain him without charge and hold
him indefinitely. Courts have agreed the president has wide
latitude to imprison people captured overseas or caught
fighting against the U.S. That is what the prison at
Guantanamo Bay in Cuba is for.
But al-Marri was not in Guantanamo Bay.
"The president is not a king and cannot lock people up forever
in the United States based on his say-so," said Jonathan
Hafetz, a lawyer who represents al-Marri and other detainees.
"Today it's Mr. al-Marri. Tomorrow it could be you, a member
of your family, someone you know. Once you allow the president
to lock people up for years or even life without trial,
there's no going back."
Glenn Sulmasy, a national security fellow at Harvard, said the
issue comes down to whether the nation is at war. Soldiers
would not need warrants to launch a strike against invading
troops. So would they need a warrant to raid an al-Qaida safe
house in a U.S. suburb?
Sulmasy says no. That's how Congress wrote the bill and "if
they feel concerned about civil liberties, they can tighten up
the language," he said.
That would require the politically risky move of pu****ng
legislation to make it harder for the president to detain
suspected terrorists inside the U.S.
Al-Marri is not the first prisoner who did not fit neatly into
the definition of enemy combatant.
Two U.S. citizens, Yaser Esam Hamdi and Jose Padilla, were
held at the same brig as al-Marri. But there are differences.
Hamdi was captured on an Afghanistan battlefield. Padilla,
too, fought alongside the Taliban before his capture in the
United States.
By comparison, al-Marri had not been on the battlefield. He
was lawfully living in the United States. That raises new
questions.
Did Congress really intend to give the president the authority
to lock up suspected terrorists overseas but not those living
here?
If another Sept. 11-like plot was discovered, could the
military imprison the would-be hijackers before they stepped
onto the planes?
Is a foreign battlefield really necessary in a conflict that
turned downtown Manhattan into ground zero?
Also, if enemy combatants can be detained in the U.S., how
long can they be held without charge? Without lawyers? Without
access to the outside world? Forever?
These questions play to two of the biggest fears that have
dominated public policy debate since Sept. 11: the fear of
another terrorist attack and the fear the government will use
that threat to crack down on civil liberties.
"If he is taken to a civilian court in the United States and
it's been proved he is guilty and it's been proved there's
evidence to show that he's guilty, you know, he deserves what
he gets," his brother, Mohammed al-Marri, said in a telephone
interview Friday from his home in Saudi Arabia. "But he's just
been taken there with no court, no nothing. That's shame on
the United States."
Courts have gone back and forth on al-Marri's case as it
worked its way through the system. The last decision, a 2-1
ruling by a 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel, found
that the president had crossed the line and al-Marri must be
returned to the civilian court system. Anything else would
"alter the constitutional foundations of our Republic," the
judges said.
The full appeals court is reviewing that decision and a ruling
is expected soon. During arguments last year, government
lawyers said the courts should give great deference to the
president when the nation is at war.
"What you assert is the power of the military to seize a
person in the United States, including an American citizen, on
suspicion of being an enemy combatant?" Judge William B.
Traxler asked.
"Yes, your honor," Justice Department lawyer Gregory Garre
replied.
The court seemed torn.
One judge questioned why there was such anxiety over the
policy. After all, there have been no mass roundups of
citizens and no indications the White House is coming for
innocent Americans next.
Another judge said the question is not whether the president
was generous in his use of power; it is whether the power is
constitutional.
Whatever the decision, the case seems destined for the Supreme
Court. In the meantime, the first military trials are set to
begin soon against detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Al-Marri may
get one, too. Or he may get put back into the civilian court
system. For now, he waits.
---
On the Net:
Do***ents and information from al-Marri's defense team:
http://tinyurl.com/6kp58o
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/ENEMY_COMBATANT?
SITE=MABOC&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2008-05-24-12-
13-37
--
A government, of, by, and, for: Rich, Elite, Freemasons.
But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the
light:
for whatsoever doth make manifest is light.
The light ****neth in darkness;
and the darkness comprehended it not.
The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be
single,
thy whole body shall be full of light.
But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of
darkness.
If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great
is that darkness!
Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead,
and Christ shall give thee light.
For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
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