What does it say that the charges Hamdan was convicted of did not even exist until 2006 - 5 years after we imprisoned him?
Or that this may be the best case prosecutors have against a detainee because Hamdan himself cooperated?
And how does this process compare with Blackwater? Or the law our congress created to give American's immunity from crimes committed in Iraq? People we dont like get life in prison; people we pay get the ability to commit murder?
When will this very public travesty of American justice end? One can only hope it will be 1.20.2009.
Bin Laden Ex-Driver Is Convicted
Military Tribunal Acquits Hamdan Of Greater Charge
August 7, 2008
Wall Street Journal
GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba -- A military commission convicted Osama bin Laden's former driver of supporting terrorism, the first verdict delivered here since President George W. Bush announced plans in November 2001 to try accused foreign terrorists in a separate system of offshore military courts.
"The bigger problem for future cases is that the evidence in Hamdan's case is about as good as it gets," said a government official familiar with the matter. Unlike the vast majority of the 80 or so Guantanamo prisoners slated for trial, Mr. Hamdan "was incredibly cooperative in his interrogations, gave information that was able to be corroborated, was identified in videos serving as a bodyguard for bin Laden and was captured with two missiles in the trunk of his car," the official said.
A prosecutor, Lt. Cmdr. Tim Stone, noted that even the single remaining specification, out of 10 with which the government originally charged Mr. Hamdan, carries up to a life term.
A military commissions advocate-turned-critic, former chief prosecutor Col. Morris Davis, scoffed at that prospect. If the former driver "gets a hefty sentence, it's got to send cold chills down the spines of [Mr. bin Laden's] barber and dry cleaner," Col. Davis said.
Although the military commission carries some structural resemblance to a court-martial, it is bound by a special rulebook that provides defendants with fewer rights than the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which has governed every U.S. military trial since 1951. Moreover, the 2006 law authorizing the commissions includes offenses that traditionally have not been considered war crimes, such as the two charges Mr. Hamdan faced, conspiracy and providing material support for terrorism.
Mr. Hamdan, 37 years old, bowed his head and wept softly after the verdict was read in the windowless courtroom, built inside an old aircraft control building.
