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9/11 Patsies Withdraw Offer To Confess
Peter Finn
Washington
Post
Wednesday, Dec 10, 2008
Five of the men accused of planning the Sept. 11,
2001, attacks said Monday that they wanted to plead guilty to
murder and war crimes but withdrew the offer when a military judge
raised questions about whether it would prevent them from fulfilling
their desire to receive the death penalty.
"Are you saying if we plead guilty we will
not be able to be sentenced to death?" Khalid Sheik Mohammed,
the self-proclaimed operational mastermind of the attacks, asked
at a pretrial hearing here.
The seesaw proceedings Monday raised and then postponed the prospect
of a conviction in a case that has become the centerpiece of the
system of military justice created by the Bush administration.
A conviction would have capped a seven-year quest for justice
after the 2001 attacks, but the delay in entering pleas will probably
extend the process beyond the end of the Bush presidency.
(ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW)
The willingness of the defendants to "announce our confessions
and plea in full," according to a document they sent to the
judge in the case, Army Col. Stephen Henley, potentially bestows
some hard decisions on the incoming administration. President-elect
Barack Obama has vowed to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility,
but he has not indicated whether he will retain the military commissions
that may be close to securing the death penalty for suspects in
the worst terrorist attacks in U.S. history.
If the judge ultimately accepts guilty pleas, the ability of
the Obama administration to transfer the case to federal court
-- a desire expressed by some Obama advisers -- might be constrained,
said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil
Liberties Union. That could mean the new administration may have
to oversee an execution resulting from a process that many Obama
supporters and legal advisers regard as deeply flawed.
Full
article here
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