Another Saddam Co-Defendant's Lawyer Slain

[Bethany Rockafella]

Another Saddam Co-Defendant's Lawyer Slain

By SAMEER N. YACOUB
Associated Press Writer
Published November 8, 2005, 8:32 AM CST


BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Three gunmen in a speeding car killed a lawyer for a co-defendant in Saddam Hussein's trial and wounded another Tuesday in Baghdad, a member of the defense team and police said. It was the second assassination of a Saddam defense team lawyer in less than a month.

Adel al-Zubeidi, who was representing former Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan, was shot to death and attorney Thamir al-Khuzaie was wounded in the ambush in the predominately Sunni Arab neighborhood of Adil, according to lawyer Khamees Hamid al-Ubaidi.

Saddam's main lawyer, Khalil al-Dulaimi, blamed the government for Tuesday's attack, telling Al-Jazeera television that the shooting was carried by "an armed group using government vehicles."

"The aim of these organized attacks is to scare Arab and foreign lawyers," al-Dulaimi said. "We call upon the international community, on top of them the Secretary-General of the United Nations, to send an investigative committee because the situation is unbearable."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-saddam-trial-lawyer-killed,1,270697.story?coll=chi-news-hed