By Mark O’Brien
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America
WASHINGTON, United States — In a motion filed this week, the U.S. Justice Department requested just one federal judge decide which rules apply to lawyers representing suspects being held at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Government lawyers asked for Chief Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to be the decider in a growing dispute between the government and defense lawyers.
The issue is whether detainees who have lost their one-shot habeas cases can have continued access to their counsel.
“Respondents request that the instant Motions for Counsel Access be referred to a single judge for a coordinated ruling on the counsel-access issue that will govern in these and all other Guantanamo Bay habeas cases,” the motion stated.
According to Politico, Guantanamo leaders have tried “to unilaterally impose rules for lawyers’ visits to Guantanamo when no court proceedings are pending. Lawyers for some inmates have complained that they should continue to be covered by orders issued by judges in Washington. They argue that prisoners are free to file successive petitions for release, so the visits are directly tied to potential litigation.”
The filing stems from a case in which Yasin Qasem Muhammad Ismail, a Yemeni national detained at Guantanamo, was told he no longer had the right to see his counsel after losing his habeas petition. An email from the Justice Department to Ismail’s lawyer reportedly said Ismail could only meet his lawyer if the lawyer signed a new “memorandum of understanding.” Ismail’s lawyer, David Remes, described that new MOU as giving the government “absolute authority over access to counsel.”
According to Scotusblog, Remes challenged the new MOU earlier this month in federal court.
“As long as [Ismail] is detained, he retains the right to pursue any available legal avenues to obtain his release,” Remes argued, according to court papers.
As Scotusblog put it, those other avenues include “the right to file a new or amended habeas challenge, or to file a formal motion to have his case reopened in District Court.”
But this new legal challenge is not the only complaint defense lawyers have raised regarding the system for terror suspects detained at Guantanamo.
Just last week, lawyers for Saudi defendant Abd al Rahim al Nashiri alleged that the military official in charge of the tribunal attempted to rig the Guantanamo court to deliver the death sentence. Nashiri is charged in connection with planning the al Qaeda attack on the USS Cole off the coast of Yemen in 2000, killing 17 sailors and injuring dozens more.
The defense accused retired Vice Admiral Bruce MacDonald of “unprecedented bureaucratic meddling” in instructing the judge how to carry out jury selection, something normally left to the judge alone.
The instructions would result in a jury panel “that numerically favors a death sentence,” said Lieutenant Commander Stephen Reyes, a lawyer for Nashiri.
For further information, please see:
Lawfare — On Continued Counsel Access at Gitmo and the Government’s Filing — 27 July 2012
Politico — Feds: Single Judge Should Rule on Rules for Lawyers at Guantanamo — 26 July 2012
Reuters — Defense Lawyers say Guantanamo Court Rigged to Deliver Death Sentence — 19 July 2012
The Christian Science Monitor — Guantanamo Judge Refuses to Step Aside — 17 July 2012
Scotusblog — Are “Boumediene Rights” Expiring? — 13 July 2012
