Pressured Into Guilty Pleas?
Here's something I hadn't thought about before in regards to the Justice Department's ability to label somebody with the 'enemy combatant' tag. Hit & Run agrues (quite convincingly) that although the enemy combatant label hasn't been used very often so far, the mere threat of it against a suspect may be enough to get them to plead guilty to crimes they may or may not have committed.
According to The New York Times, "Prosecutors discussed the idea of declaring Mr. Faris an enemy combatant...and that may have influenced his decision to admit guilt to avoid the prospect of indefinite detention." I have no reason to doubt that Faris, who pleaded guilty and faces a 20-year prison sentence, really did discuss the Brooklyn Bridge's vulnerability to blowtorches with members of Al Qaeda. But it's not hard to see how someone who was mistakenly accused of terrorism might choose a finite prison sentence over "enemy combatant" limbo.
This is a serious issue that has to call into question the series of guilty pleas that the Justice Dept has been able to get from terrorism-related suspects over the past year.
According to The New York Times, "Prosecutors discussed the idea of declaring Mr. Faris an enemy combatant...and that may have influenced his decision to admit guilt to avoid the prospect of indefinite detention." I have no reason to doubt that Faris, who pleaded guilty and faces a 20-year prison sentence, really did discuss the Brooklyn Bridge's vulnerability to blowtorches with members of Al Qaeda. But it's not hard to see how someone who was mistakenly accused of terrorism might choose a finite prison sentence over "enemy combatant" limbo.
This is a serious issue that has to call into question the series of guilty pleas that the Justice Dept has been able to get from terrorism-related suspects over the past year.
# | June 20, 2003