Guilty Pleas By Gitmo Detainees In Capital Cases
An interesting paradox is presented by this story:
The Obama administration is considering a change in the law for the military commissions at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, that would clear the way for detainees facing the death penalty to plead guilty without a full trial. . . . American military justice law, which is the model for the military commission rules, bars members of the armed services who are facing capital charges from pleading guilty. Partly to assure fairness when execution is possible, court-martial prosecutors are required to prove guilt in a trial even against service members who want to plead guilty.
So by placing people like Khalid Sheik Mohammed in a military commission system, the Bush Administration (and now by extension, the Obama Administration) has inadvertently forced the issue of torture into the equation. Of course, in civil courts, KSM and others like him could plead guilty (in spite of the torture committed upon them) and the issue of torture would not require the airing military commissions would require. As an ACLU spokesman puts it:
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