Saturday, June 18, 2005

Military lawyer testified that he was assigned to represent one of the prisoners at Guantánamo, for the sole purpose of extracting a guilty plea

Who We Are - New York Times: "Published: June 18, 2005

For more than three and a half years since the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Congress has been derelict in its duty to assert control over the prison camps created by President Bush in the shadows beyond the Constitution, the rule of law and a half-century of international laws and treaties. So it was a relief to watch the hearing this week by Senator Arlen Specter's Judiciary Committee on the prison camp at Guant�namo Bay, Cuba, and to hear Mr. Specter declare that it was time for Congress to do its job and bring the American chain of prison camps under the law.
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At the hearing, four military and civilian officials overseeing the processing of prisoners at Guantánamo could not, or would not, provide the most basic information - such as how many detainees there are and what countries they came from. Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, a military lawyer, later courageously testified that he was assigned to represent one of the prisoners at Guantánamo, for the sole purpose of extracting a guilty plea. He provided a written order that contradicted the denials of the man who made the assignment, Brig. Gen. Thomas Hemingway, who oversees the military tribunals Mr. Bush created after 9/11 to screen selected prisoners away from public and judicial scrutiny.

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