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Banned
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OKAY....Morris Davis receives some sort of vindication, even if it comes too late to save his military career, but maybe it is a sign that there are still some elements of the military command that are not as corrupt as the civiliann administration that commands it:
Quote:
http://static1.firedoglake.com/28/fi...ffiliate56.pdf
(Big file....2 mb...)
Above is link to copy of legal motion resulting in the following
Quote:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1210...googlenews_wsj
Key Official Barred From
Trial at Guantanamo
By JESS BRAVIN
May 12, 2008
WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon is set any day now to approve trials at Guantanamo Bay for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and five others accused in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But a military-court ruling late last week against a top Defense Department war-crimes official throws a new cloud over the Bush administration's plan to prosecute the alleged Sept. 11 conspirators before the president leaves office in January.
The proposed charges were announced in February by Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann, a hard-charging Air Force reservist brought in to jump-start the long-stalled plan for offshore trials.
Friday, a military judge at Guantanamo barred Gen. Hartmann from participating in the case against Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's former driver, who faces a potential life term. The judge, Navy Capt. Keith Allred, granted a defense motion alleging an "unlawful command influence."
Mr. Hamdan's Navy lawyer, Lt. Cmdr. Brian Mizer, had alleged that Gen. Hartmann's dual role of supervising the prosecution and providing legal advice to the commissions administrator, who must make impartial rulings on issues raised by both the prosecution and defense, constituted a conflict of interest.
Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said Sunday that officials were surprised at the ruling, because they believe the structure Capt. Allred rejected is similar to that used in courts-martial. The Pentagon is considering asking the military judge to reconsider his ruling, Mr. Morrell said.
<img src="http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/HC-GH816_Davis_20060409182845.gif">
[Morris (Moe) Davis]
Friday's ruling applies only to the Hamdan case. But defense lawyers say underlying issues apply to every prosecution at Guantanamo and are certain to resurface in other trials. Cmdr. Mizer, who also represents alleged 9/11 conspirator Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, said he plans to file a similar motion in that case.
Unlike most military defendants, Mr. Hamdan had an unusual ally in his motion: Col. Morris Davis, who resigned as chief prosecutor in October after clashes with Gen. Hartmann over control of the prosecution office. Col. Davis claimed that Gen. Hartmann had breached legislation authorizing the military commissions, which seeks to insulate the prosecution from improper influence. The Pentagon backed Gen. Hartmann. Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England approved the arrangement.
Rather than quietly seeking reassignment, Col. Davis launched a public campaign to vindicate his position, granting interviews and writing opinion articles. Among other allegations, Col. Davis suggested political motivations behind the selection and timing of certain cases, and complained that Gen. Hartmann had second-guessed some of his decisions, such as excluding evidence obtained through waterboarding, an interrogation method critics call torture.
<h3>Last month, Col. Davis, called as a defense witness, testified in a Guantanamo courtroom that the process had been tainted.
</h3>
Mr. Morrell said he didn't expect the issue to resurface in other cases, because Col. Davis left the military commissions office before charges were submitted for the 9/11 conspiracy. But Gen. Hartmann has been involved in developing the 9/11 cases, officials have said, which might still allow defense attorneys to question whether those charges have been tainted.
Capt. Allred denied other defense requests, notably to have Mr. Hamdan's charges dismissed. <h3>Capt. Allred's 13-page ruling adopting as official findings many of the allegations Col. Davis had made and that Pentagon officials had previously dismissed.
The order removes Gen. Hartmann from any role in Mr. Hamdan's case, bars the appointment of any of Gen. Hartmann's deputies as his successor and forbids any retaliation against military officers who offered testimony against Gen. Hartmann.</h3>
Cmdr. Mizer said the ruling would do nothing to change Mr. Hamdan's immediate circumstances and that he would be back in court for another hearing later this month.
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So what kind of military justice system are we left with, now that honest, ethical Col. Morris Davis has left the military and there is a ruling that Gen. Hartmann is removed from the process of trying one gitmo prisoner, and:
"Gen. Hartmann [is barred] from any role in Mr. Hamdan's case, bars the appointment of any of Gen. Hartmann's deputies as his successor and forbids any retaliation against military officers who offered testimony against Gen. Hartmann."
Should Gen. Hartmann be ordered to resign, or be permitted to carry out his version of "justice" against other gitmo prisoners?
Where does the Bush administation manage to find so many thugs to carry out it's "vision"? It seems that there are an endless supply available.
UPDATE: This is an excerpt from the link at the top of the last quote box:
Quote:
http://static1.firedoglake.com/28/fi...ffiliate56.pdf
United States of America<br><p>
v.<br><p>
Salim Ahmed Hamdanbr><p>
D-026<br>
RULING ON MOTION<br>
TO DISMISS (UNLAWFUL INFLUENCE)<br>
9 May 2008
With Respect to the motion to disqualify the Legal Advisor:
....4. The Commission is troubled by the following actions of the Legal Advisor that reflect
too close an involvement in the prosecution of the commission cases:
(a) WHile RMC 705 authorizes the Legal Advisor to initiat pretrial agreement
negotiations, General Hartmann intended to personally cont the them without any consultation
with or the company of the trial counsel. This worked successfully with an agreement was
reached in Hicks, but may compromise the Legal Authority's objective position under other
circumstance.
(b) Telling the Chief Prosecutor (and other prosecutors) that certain types of cases would
be tried, and that otheres would not be tried, because political factors such as whether they
would capture the imagination of the American people, be sexy, or involve blood on the hands of
the accused, suggests that factors other than those pertaining to the merits of the case were at
play.
(c) Appearing to direct, or attempting to direct, the Chief Prosecutor to use evidence that
the Chief Prosecutor considered tainted and unreliable, or perhaps obtained as the result of
torture or coercion, was clearly an effort to influence the professional judgment of the Chief
Prosecutor. While it is true that the trial judge is ultimately gatekeeper for each item of
evidence, each Prosecutor also has an ethical duty not to present evidence he considers
unreliable.
(d) Challenging the Chief Prosecutor's decision to take to trial first the cases he
considered the most serious suggest an improper influence on the Chief Prosecutor's discretion.
(e) Making public statements in which he aligned himself with the prosecution, took
creit for their success and indicated that he is their leader.
(f) "Nanomanagement" of the Prosecutor's office to such an extent that it could be
considered "cruelty and maltreatment" suggests a greater level of involvement than a
Legal Advisor can properly engage in without becoming identified as part of the prosecution.
Page 11
(g) The Legal Advisor's intimate involvement in the details of prosecutorial decision
making have led one prosecutor to resign, another to seek ehtical guidance from the Navy JAG
ethics office, and has led both prosecutors in this case, and their former supervisor, to believe
they were being "nano-managed" in both performance of his duties and the exercise of their
discretion.
(h) Finally, the national attention focused on this dispute has seriously called into
question the Legal Advisor's ability to continue to perform his duties in a neutral and objective
manner. While the public's view of the matter is not controlling, the fact that a national
magazine should have called the public's attention to General Hartmann's actions and suggested
that he no longer can perform his duties is deeply disturbing.
DECISION AND ORDER...
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Here is the article mentioned in (h), above...the one that helped this miltary commission to rule on 9 May, 2008, in response to a motion from defense attorneys representing Osama Bin Laden's driver, rule, in effect that gitmo "justice" Legal Advisor, Gen. Thomas Hartmann, is an ASSHAT !
Quote:
http://harpers.org/archive/2008/02/hbc-90002460
TITLE
The Great Guantánamo Puppet Theater
DEPARTMENT No Comment
BY Scott Horton
PUBLISHED February 21, 2008
Last week the Department of Defense launched a major media offensive. It announced that trials of six “high-value detainees” linked to the attacks on 9/11 would be charged in proceedings before the Guantánamo military commissions this spring. Specific accusations concerning the roles played by each of the six in the tragedy of 9/11 were all over the media. For the most part, the media has only lightly embroidered the Pentagon’s script. The Washington Post told us about the “clean team” that the Pentagon had sent in, top-notch no-nonsense prosecutors to do the job. PBS’s NewsHour gave an extended segment over to the Pentagon’s key spokesman on the issue, Brigadier General Thomas Hartmann, to set out the case for the proceedings. ......
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Last edited by host; 05-11-2008 at 08:25 PM..
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