New Judge in 9/11 Trial Lacked Enough Experience For Job Last Year

Politics|Military Assigns Judge to 9/11 Case Who Lacked Enough Experience Last Year

WASHINGTON — An Air Force justice who had been considered excessively inexperienced past twelvemonth to oversee the proceedings of 5 prisoners astatine Guantánamo Bay who are accused of plotting the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, was named connected Friday to preside successful the case.

In October, Col. Matthew N. McCall was chosen arsenic the justice for the decease punishment lawsuit involving Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, but his sanction was withdrawn aft prosecutors protested. Under the rules for subject commissions, they said, helium had not yet served for 2 years arsenic a subject judge, a prerequisite for a justice astatine the warfare court. He passed that milestone past month.

In the intervening year, according to Air Force judiciary records, Colonel McCall has presided successful respective intersexual battle and drug-related courts-martial of work members.

On Friday, Col. Lanny J. Acosta Jr. of the Army, the main justice for subject commissions, reassigned Colonel McCall to the lawsuit successful a single-page memo that made nary notation of the earlier stumble.

Now it volition beryllium up to Colonel McCall, who is based successful Virginia, to determine whether to assemble the tribunal adjacent period for 2 weeks of hearings astatine Guantánamo. The court’s judiciary office had reserved Sept. 6-17 for hearings successful the case, which volition straddle the 20th day of the Sept. 11 attacks.

If helium sits connected the seat astatine Guantánamo, Colonel McCall would beryllium the case’s 4th judge, Others person filled successful for administrative purposes.

No hearings person been held passim the coronavirus pandemic fixed that astir each participant, with the objection of the defendants, indispensable question there. The basal has 6,000 residents and has been nether strict restrictions, like, for example, requiring unvaccinated visitors to quarantine for 2 weeks. Those restrictions were precocious extended aft the basal reported caller cases arsenic the highly contagious Delta variant is surging.

The case, which has been successful pretrial proceedings, has fundamentally been without a justice since Col. W. Shane Cohen of the Air Force abruptly chose to retire from the work successful March 2020. He had started holding hearings meant to resoluteness the cardinal question of which grounds is not tainted by torture and would beryllium admissible astatine a trial. Mr. Cohen has since joined the territory attorney’s bureau successful Salt Lake City arsenic a authoritative successful his autochthonal Utah.

For Colonel McCall, the archetypal bid of concern is apt to beryllium determining whether helium has immoderate conflicts that mightiness marque his serving arsenic a justice impossible. At the warfare court, that means prosecutors and defence lawyers inquire caller judges a bid of questions astir their inheritance to analyse for imaginable bias, and determine whether they are acceptable to serve. A Marine justice who was earlier chosen for the role, Col. Stephen F. Keane, disqualified himself aft realizing helium had adjacent relationships with victims of the attacks that killed astir 3,000 radical successful New York, successful Pennsylvania and astatine the Pentagon.

Another question that an aboriginal proceeding volition code is the practice of 1 of the defendants, Ramzi bin al-Shibh. The lawyer who had represented him since arraignment successful the lawsuit successful May 2012 had stopped traveling to the basal connected aesculapian advice. To win him, the Pentagon hired David I. Bruck, a lawyer with superior defence acquisition who began gathering with Mr. bin al-Shibh this summer, erstwhile pandemic restrictions and quarantines eased.

The past tribunal league was held successful February 2020. The caller justice volition request to acceptable a caller timetable for the enactment of a assemblage of U.S. subject officers to preside successful the trial. Military retirements, the pandemic, problems with disposable infrastructure astatine the distant basal and questions astir the admissibility of and entree to lawsuit grounds person derailed an earlier schedule. Also, nether the existent timetable, Mr. bin al-Shibh has antithetic deadlines for filing ineligible briefs.

The Pentagon has ordered prefabricated lodging for lawyers and jurors successful the case, which could beryllium installed sometime adjacent twelvemonth astatine the impermanent tribunal compound atop an abandoned airstrip. In preparation, American forces tore down a structure metropolis that had housed up to 60 journalists during pretrial proceedings and person yet to regenerate it.

Colonel McCall inherits a lawsuit with much than 33,100 pages of transcripts of proceedings and much than 100 unresolved ineligible motions. Because each 5 defendants spent years successful C.I.A. custody, wherever they were tortured, overmuch of the lawsuit worldly is classified and the justice needs to person a specialized apical concealed information clearance to reappraisal it.