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Judge in USS Cole bombing death penalty case at Gitmo sentences Marine BG Chief Defense Counsel to 21 days & $1K fine for contempt Login/Join 
Info Guru
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posted
Sounds like a real mess.

Background:

http://www.miamiherald.com/new...rticle181879046.html

Guantánamo judge orders contempt hearing to try to end defense revolt at war court

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, CUBA
In rapid succession Tuesday, a Marine general refused to testify and refused to rescind an order releasing three civilian defense lawyers, a Navy defense attorney refused to file pleadings and a military judge scheduled a contempt hearing in the USS Cole death-penalty case.

All were firsts at the war court created after the Sept. 11 attacks to handle national security cases, as judge Air Force Col. Vance Spath sought to stabilize a collapsed defense team in the case against Abd al Rahim al Nashiri. The 52-year-old Saudi is accused of orchestrating al-Qaida’s Oct. 12, 2000 warship bombing that killed 17 U.S. sailors, and could be executed if convicted.

The issue of the moment was how to continue pretrial hearings in the absence of a criminal defense attorney with death-penalty experience. Although by law a capital case requires a so-called learned counsel, Spath concluded the case could go forward because one wasn’t available.

But the larger drama was driven by a decision by three civilian attorneys to quit the case over a secret ethical issue involving, they say, compromised attorney-client privacy at the war-on-terror prison where the alleged terrorists are held.

The chief defense counsel, Marine Brig. Gen. John Baker, released attorneys Rick Kammen, Rosa Eliades and Mary Spears from the case in mid-October based on secret information the public cannot know. Spath ruled that only a judge, not Baker, had the authority to excuse lawyers of record — and ordered the general to swear an oath and answer questions about the episode.

Baker stood three rows behind the defendant and refused, invoking a privilege.

The judge then ordered the general to rescind his decision to excuse the three lawyers. “I’m definitely not doing that,” the Marine general replied. Baker maintains that under the war court rule book he has the unchecked authority to release defense attorneys for “good cause.”

Spath next turned to Nashiri’s only remaining attorney of record on the case, Navy Lt. Alaric Piette, and ordered him to fill the void by filing legal pleadings and participating in the questioning of an unidentified witness due in court later in the week. “If I’m wrong, your client can get a windfall because I’ve ordered to go forward without learned counsel,” Spath said, adding, “learned counsel are not practicable in the near term, if ever, by the actions of General Baker.”

Piette, a former Navy SEAL and 2012 Georgetown Law graduate, declared himself willing to defend Nashiri but unable to do so without a death-penalty defender. “What I am not going to do is make any more pleadings,” the lieutenant said, “because I see the slippery slope.”

Spath also ordered Baker to order Eliades and Spears, both on his Military Commissions defense staff, to get to Guantánamo for a contempt hearing scheduled for noon Wednesday. He told Baker to urge Kammen to come, too.

Spath’s morning hearing mostly followed the script of a 22-page pleading filed by prosecutors a day earlier on how to move forward. They accused the defense team of adopting a “scorched-earth strategy,” and called their request to stop until a new death-penalty defender is on the case “a manipulative monkey wrench.”

The filing signed by the civilian lead prosecutor Mark Miller recommended that Spath order Baker to testify to build a record, set a 24-hour time limit for the resigned lawyers to appear, hold a contempt hearing and move on to taking court testimony.

Throughout it all, the Saudi captive who was held for four years by the CIA sat silently at the defense table in the rumpled white scrubs-style prison uniform of a Guantánamo captive.

The hearing lasted about an hour, including a 15-minute recess, and began with Spath advising Nashiri that he needed to be present for possible contempt proceedings.

The judge also obliquely mentioned the Top Secret ethical issue that drove the defense team to resign, saying the prosecution had voluntarily described an episode involving another detainee and other defense attorneys, not those in the Cole case.

Spath said he denied a request by Kammen to brief Nashiri about the problem, apparently in order to obtain a waiver of attorney-client confidentiality, because “I am statutorily prohibited from ordering the disclosure of classified information, which everyone knows.” And he said he denied a defense request to get more information about the issue because it had no ties to the Cole case.

A judge’s contempt authority at the war court, as spelled out in the rules, covers actual disruptions at court and can be punished by 30 days in a prison or brig and a $1,000 fine. Under the rules, a person found in contempt has an opportunity to appeal the finding to the overseer of military commissions, called the Convening Authority.

But the chief prosecutor, Army Brig. Gen. Mark Martins, put his defense counterpart, Baker, on notice in a Saturday afternoon email that Martins considered failure to appear a “very real disturbance and disorder to the military commission’s proceedings.”

Yet to be seen is whether Piette’s refusing to litigate in the absence of a capital case qualified defender is contempt.

Throughout the quick hearing, the judge also repeatedly suggested that, if the Military Commissions Defense Organization led by Baker disagreed with the various authorities Spath invoked in court, they should seek swift review by the U.S. Court of Military Commissions Review, the Pentagon-run appeals court for war court cases.

_____________________________

And today:




“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
- John Adams
 
Posts: 29408 | Location: In the red hinterlands of Deep Blue VA | Registered: June 29, 2001Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Do No Harm,
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Wow, what a circus.




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Posts: 11446 | Location: NC | Registered: August 16, 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Staring back
from the abyss
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You can't HANDLE the truth!


________________________________________________________
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Posts: 19976 | Location: Montana | Registered: November 01, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Lawyer circle-jerk, imagine that. Throw in the egos of military officers and you have another level of WTF.

War tribunals should be short and sweet. Then to the firing squad.

Pretty frustrating that we are talking about this 17 years later. Terrorists scoff at our ruminations over due process.

--------------------------------------------


Proverbs 27:17 - As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.
 
Posts: 8940 | Location: Florida | Registered: September 20, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Plowing straight ahead come what may
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quote:
Originally posted by Gustofer:
You can't HANDLE the truth!


First thing that popped into my mind.


********************************************************

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Posts: 10580 | Location: Southeast Tennessee...not far above my homestate Georgia | Registered: March 10, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
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quote:
Originally posted by BamaJeepster:
_____________

And today:



His quarters are in Gitmo?





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Bart: Alright, we'll settle this like men, with our fists.
Hedley Lamarr: Sorry, I just remembered . . . I am armed.
 
Posts: 6845 | Location: Atlanta | Registered: April 23, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Info Guru
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quote:
Originally posted by Shaql:
His quarters are in Gitmo?


Yes, he is stationed there.



“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
- John Adams
 
Posts: 29408 | Location: In the red hinterlands of Deep Blue VA | Registered: June 29, 2001Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Step by step walk the thousand mile road
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I can see the headline now....


Abd al Rahim al Nashiri, 112, died yesterday while his legal defense team argued......



This is why military tribunals were a bad idea.

The prisoners at GITMO should have been interrogated, then shot, long before they left the "battlefield."





Nice is overrated

"It's every freedom-loving individual's duty to lie to the government."
Airsoftguy, June 29, 2018
 
Posts: 31385 | Location: Loudoun County, Virginia | Registered: May 17, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
The Unmanned Writer
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quote:
Originally posted by Shaql:
quote:
Originally posted by BamaJeepster:
_____________

And today:



His quarters are in Gitmo?


Bet you won't see an active duty member sending out something like this.

My guess is the Baker, the General, and the USN Lt discussed this beforehand, knew what was going to be said in court, and all knew the results before court was opened. No surprises for the participants.







Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.



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Are the deeds of a man in his prime


 
Posts: 14020 | Location: It was Lat: 33.xxxx Lon: 44.xxxx now it's CA :( | Registered: March 22, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Oh stewardess,
I speak jive.
Picture of 46and2
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The USS Cole bombing was in October of 2000.

I know the wheels of justice move slowly, but damn.
 
Posts: 25613 | Registered: March 12, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
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quote:
Originally posted by 46and2:
The USS Cole bombing was in October of 2000.

I know the wheels of justice move slowly, but damn.


November 2002 - US officials announce Abd al Rahim al-Nashiri, an alleged planner of the attack, has been captured and is being interrogated at a secret location.

(I could not remember, I had to look it up)

http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/18/...ast-facts/index.html
 
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10mm is The
Boom of Doom
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posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by Sigmund:
quote:
Originally posted by 46and2:
The USS Cole bombing was in October of 2000.

I know the wheels of justice move slowly, but damn.

November 2002 - US officials announce Abd al Rahim al-Nashiri, an alleged planner of the attack, has been captured and is being interrogated at a secret location.

(I could not remember, I had to look it up)

http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/18/...ast-facts/index.html

Even a very slow wood chipper would have finished with him by now.




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The Dhimocrats love America like ticks love a hound.
 
Posts: 17459 | Location: Northern Virginia | Registered: November 08, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Oh stewardess,
I speak jive.
Picture of 46and2
posted Hide Post
One can only hope he was waterboarded or worse throughout the last 15yrs.
 
Posts: 25613 | Registered: March 12, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Go ahead punk, make my day
posted Hide Post
quote:
Lawyer circle-jerk, imagine that. Throw in the egos of military officers and you have another level of WTF.

Yup.

21 days confinement to quarters is probably a vacation from the shit show that is the "war tribunals". $1000? Please, money well spent for a free vacation.

Funny to see AF COL vs USMC BG.
 
Posts: 45798 | Registered: July 12, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
His Royal Hiney
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The sad thing is this bruhaha is over a war combatant and not US military person.



"It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life – daily and hourly. Our answer must consist not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual." Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, 1946.
 
Posts: 19588 | Location: The Free State of Arizona - Ditat Deus | Registered: March 24, 2011Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I am speechless!!

A General Officer (esp Marine) held in contempt for following the rules!!

I do not understand...


No quarter
.308/.223
 
Posts: 2081 | Location: Central Florida.  | Registered: March 04, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
semi-reformed sailor
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quote:
Originally posted by tleddy:
I am speechless!!

A General Officer (esp Marine) held in contempt for following the rules!!

I do not understand...


The General can appeal the order of Contempt to a higher Courts and this may be what he intended to do to keep the Judge in-line with the agreed upon rules. With things being Classified-we may never know who is playing shenanigans, but it sounds like the Gen. is following the rules.



"Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor.” Robert A. Heinlein

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Posts: 11247 | Location: Temple, Texas! | Registered: October 07, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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https://www.navytimes.com/news...d-at-guantanamo-bay/

Pentagon suspends sentence against Marine 1-star detained at Guantanamo Bay

Associated Press Nov 23, 2017

MIAMI — A Pentagon spokesman says a Marine Corps general is no longer confined to quarters for contempt at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The Pentagon suspended a sentence that found Brig. Gen. John Baker should be confined to quarters for 21 days and fined $1,000, pending a review by a Defense Department legal official, Air Force Maj. Ben Sakrisson said.

Baker was informed of the decision Friday while awaiting a ruling to a legal challenge filed in civilian federal court in Washington.

Baker is in charge of the defense teams for war crimes cases at Guantanamo. A military judge ruled he was in contempt of court for dismissing three defense lawyers without court permission in the case of a prisoner charged in the 2000 attack on the destroyer Cole.

Baker refused to testify or return lawyers to the case, attempting to tell the judge, Air Force Col. Vance Spath, that the war court’s attempt to try alleged terrorists who are not U.S. citizens had no jurisdiction over him, the Miami Herald originally reported.

Spath disagreed and issued the ruling against Baker on Nov. 1, shocking the general’s colleagues by having him led out of the courtroom by guards and confined immediately to his quarters inside a small trailer on the base.

Seventeen sailors were killed and 39 injured when a small, fiberglass boat piloted by two suicide bombers exploded near the hull of the Cole in October 2000. The ship was refueling at the Aden harbor in Yemen.

The three civilian attorneys, Rick Kammen, Rosa Eliades and Mary Spears, quit the case in October. Kammen had represented the defendant, Saudi Abd al Rahim al Nashiri, since 2008.

The trio withdrew because they believed the government was listening in on their legal meetings. Some information discussed in the meetings was classified so they could not explain it to Nashiri or the public.

In June, Baker told the attorneys he had “lost confidence” in the integrity of “all potential attorney-client meeting locations” at Guantanamo.

While Baker is no longer confined, “the Office of Military Commissions Convening Authority has reviewed the contempt proceedings against Brig. Gen. John G. Baker ... and determined that the findings of the military judge are correct in law and fact,” Sakrisson said in a statement released Tuesday evening.

The findings are being forwarded to “the appropriate authority overseeing Brig. Gen. Baker’s service as a Judge Advocate within the Department of the Navy, the DoD Standards of Conduct Office, and the DoD General Counsel’s Office, and the Staff Judge Advocate to the Commandant of the United States Marine Corps for an administrative ethics review,” Sakrisson said.

Sakrisson added that the convening authority ”is not requiring that Brig. Gen. Baker pay the original $1,000 fine or serve the remaining confinement term, which was initially 21 days.”

He also addressed the security concerns that led to the civilian attorneys to withdraw.

“The [convening authority] will also recommend to the Joint Detention Group at Guantanamo Bay that a ‘clean’ facility be designated or constructed which would provide continued assurances and confidence that attorney-client meeting spaces are not subject to monitoring, as the commission proceeds,” Sakrisson said.
 
Posts: 15899 | Location: Eastern Iowa | Registered: May 21, 2000Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Political Cynic
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what kind of circus is this?

15 years since capture and they're still arguing?

I thought we killed our enemies

they trying to make friends with this guy or set him up for a date with a lonely goat...



[B] Against ALL enemies, foreign and DOMESTIC


 
Posts: 53086 | Location: Tucson Arizona | Registered: January 16, 2002Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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quote:
Originally posted by nhtagmember:
what kind of circus is this?

15 years since capture and they're still arguing?

I thought we killed our enemies

they trying to make friends with this guy or set him up for a date with a lonely goat...


The military is caught between a rock and a hard place.

The terrorist military tribunals are required to be as fair and impartial as the courts inside our jurisdiction. That means some fucked up hybrid of the US Code and the UCMJ.

If BG Baker knew that the prosecution had access to privledged communications on a classified subject he was doing about all he could to let those outside the confines of GITMO know while simultaneously protecting the defense team and the case against the terrorist.

I say take death off the table in favor of life without. He'll be just as dead, and in about the same amount of time.





Nice is overrated

"It's every freedom-loving individual's duty to lie to the government."
Airsoftguy, June 29, 2018
 
Posts: 31385 | Location: Loudoun County, Virginia | Registered: May 17, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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