A small bit of justice for Gitmo detainees...

[Luminous Animal]

Back in July, Glenn Greenwald wrote about new rules for Guantanamo detainees. The affected detainees and their lawyers sued to maintain the status quo.
Today a judge ruled in their favor.

Using strong words, a federal judge has rejected the Obama administration's efforts to change the rules under which Guantanamo Bay detainees are represented by lawyers.

Denouncing what he called "an illegitimate exercise of Executive power," U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth said in his 32-page ruling that an existing 2008 court order will continue to guide detainees' access to counsel, even in cases where there is not an active habeas corpus petition.

"It is clear that the government had no legal authority to unilaterally impose a counsel-access regime, let alone one that would render detainees’ access to counsel illusory," Lamberth declared

....

"At its heart," Lamberth wrote, "this case is about whether the Executive or the Court is charged with protecting habeas petitioners’ right to access their counsel."

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/09/06/166866/judge-sides-with-gitmo-detainees.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_term=news#storylink=cpy

Link to the original DU post...
http://upload.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=1007641

Link and an excerpt of Greenwald's piece
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/07/23-6

Last week, the Obama administration imposed new arbitrary rules for Guantanamo detainees who have lost their first habeas corpus challenge. Those new rules eliminate the right of lawyers to visit their clients at the detention facility; the old rules establishing that right were in place since 2004, and were bolstered by the Supreme Court’s 2008 Boumediene ruling that detainees were entitled to a “meaningful” opportunity to contest the legality of their detention. The DOJ recently informed a lawyer for a Yemeni detainee, Yasein Khasem Mohammad Esmail, that he would be barred from visiting his client unless he agreed to a new regime of restrictive rules, including acknowledging that such visits are within the sole discretion of the camp’s military commander. Moreover, as SCOTUSblog’s Lyle Denniston explains:

Besides putting control over legal contacts entirely under a military commander’s control, the “memorandum of understanding” does not allow attorneys to share with other detainee lawyers what they learn, and does not appear to allow them to use any such information to help prepare their own client for a system of periodic review at Guantanamo of whether continued detention is justified, and may even forbid the use of such information to help prepare a defense to formal terrorism criminal charges against their client.

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[sabrina 1]

2. What happened to Sen. Leahy's Committee on Habeas Corpus?

I'm sure this will be challenged, but they should remember that even this SC did not rule in favor of the Bush administration on Habeas Corpus in Hamdi V Rumsfeld.

Good for that judge for upholding the Constitution.

[Luminous Animal]

3. Oh that's soooo 2007.