After two years during which Jose Padilla has been imprisoned in a windowless cell in a navy brig on American soil without charges—and in the final days of the Supreme Court's arriving at a decision in his case—Deputy Attorney General James Comey suddenly hurled a list of detailed accusations against this "enemy combatant" as designated by George W. Bush.
Comey was not speaking in a court-room but rather in a nationally televised press conference. Padilla could not reply to those denunciations in his own defense. Nor could his lawyers. The government had at last allowed them to speak to their client twice after the Supreme Court had surprised the Bush team by taking Hamdi's case. But their meetings with their client were listened to and videotaped by the government.
Moreover, one of Padilla's lawyers, Andrew Patel, tells me that the government has ruled that Padilla's attorneys cannot tell anyone what Padilla would say in answer to any government accusations because everything he told his lawyers is classified. Nor could his lawyers ask him about what he said in his interrogations.
James Comey, therefore, was free to say anything he wanted as he claimed that during the two years of interrogation Padilla "admitted" to certain assignments from Al Qaeda. Also, said Comey, those "admissions" were corroborated by a number of high-level Al Qaeda terrorists who have been interrogated about Padilla while in United States custody. But some of those sources told conflicting stories.
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http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0423/hentoff.phpIf Padilla ever gets a fair trial and is found guilty, we should certainly lock him up. Meanwhile, the government should stop using him for political purposes.
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