(US Appeals) Court: Bagram prisoners don't have Guantanamo habeas rights

[sabra]

Source: mcclatchydc

WASHINGTON — A key appellate court on Friday concluded prisoners held at Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan cannot challenge their captivity through rights granted under the U.S. Constitution.

In a much-anticipated decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled Yemeni native Fadi Al-Magaleh and two other men did not enjoy the same habeas rights previously extended by the Supreme Court to Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Citing geographic and other differences between the air base in Afghanistan and the naval base in Cuba, the three-judge panel overturned a trial court’s conclusion that the Bagram detainees were constitutionally similar to those held in Guantanmo.

“Guantanamo Bay is a territory that, while technically not a part of the United States, is under the complete and total control of our government,” Judge David Sentelle wrote. At Bagram, he added, “the surrounding circumstances are hardly the same.”



Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/21/94620/court-bagram-prisoners-dont-have.html

[Soylent Brice]

1. fucking dammit.

[Bragi]

2. Judges Rule Against Detainees Held at Afghan Air Base

Source: NY Times

WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court ruled on Friday that prisoners being held without trial in Afghanistan by the military have no right to challenge their imprisonment in American civilian courts. The decision, overturning a lower court ruling in the detainees’ favor, was a victory for the Obama administration’s efforts to hold terrorism suspects overseas for extended periods without judicial oversight.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/22/world/asia/22detain.html?ref=global-home

---

Another setback for international human rights and the rule of law.

[Solly Mack]

3. K&R

[Robb]

4. Could be worse. From the rest of the article:

....In overturning Judge Bates yesterday, the appeals court panel rejected arguments by lawyers for the detainees that the government would be able “to evade judicial review of executive detention decisions by transferring detainees into active combat zones, thereby granting the executive the power to switch the Constitution on or off at will.”

Judge Sentelle argued that there had been no such intent by the government with regard to the three detainees in the case, because each been brought to Afghanistan years before the Supreme Court extended constitutional rights to detainees at Guantánamo.

Still, he left the door open to approving habeas corpus rights for prisoners taken to prisons other than Guantánamo in the future.

“We need make no determination on the importance of this possibility, given that it remains only a possibility; its resolution can await a case in which the claim is a reality rather than speculation,” he wrote.....

[FiveGoodMen]

5. !

[Solly Mack]

6. K&R (again)

[classysassy]

7. In order to keep a nation down in the dirt

we have to get down there with them,why are we so inhumane?Every one that do those dastardly deeds and their supporters will bed held accountable in a higher court.

[robcon]

8. The hundreds of thousands of German prisoners in WWII didn't get habeas corpus, either.

I think the decision was right.

[Igel]

9. Many of them were held in the US.

They also didn't have habeas corpus rights.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

10. Many were, many weren't.

I think that was an issue of logistics and security during WWII. It was better to ship them all the way back to the U.S.

[atreides1]

12. True

But how many of them were tortured by the US military?

[Heywood J]

16. We weren't torturing the German prisoners, they were white.

Besides, that was an actual declared war, where we still cared about protocol and doing the right thing.

[EFerrari]

11. Mendacity.n/t

[Robb]

13. No, a narrow ruling.

The judges did leave the question open for future cases. The trouble with this one was that the lawyer for the three prisoners in question was asking the judge to rule on a possibility, rather than what had actually happened to them.

[EFerrari]

15. You know what is a certainty? That the International Criminal Court

has jurisdiction in Afghanistan. McChrystal has left this government as well as himself wide open with his abuses at Bagram. Afghanistan is not Iraq.

[The Stranger]

14. HABEAS CORPUS EXISTS AT COMMON LAW.

Habeas corpus pre-existed the U.S. Constitution, and the Constitution specifically recognizes this. It does not have to be found in the Constitution.

ON THE CONTRARY, UNLESS OTHERWISE PREEMPTED, IT EXISTS AT COMMON LAW, AND SHOULD BE RECOGNIZED BY ANY COURT ANYWHERE.