105
submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by TheDudeV2@lemmy.ca to c/news@lemmy.world

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has revoked a pre-trial agreement reached with men accused of plotting the 11 September terrorist attacks.

In a memo on Friday, Mr Austin also said he was revoking the authority of the officer overseeing the court who signed the agreement on Wednesday.

The original deal, which would reportedly have spared the alleged attackers the death penalty, was criticised by some families of victims.

The memo named five defendants including the alleged ringleader of the plot, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The original deal named three men.

"I have determined that, in light of the significance of the decision to enter into pre-trial agreements with the accused… responsibly for such a decision should rest with me as the superior authority," Mr Austin wrote to Brig Gen Susan Escallier.

"I hereby withdraw your authority. Effective immediately, in the exercise of my authority, I hereby withdraw from the three pre-trial agreements."

top 29 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] PugJesus@lemmy.world 46 points 3 months ago

Jesus fucking Christ. What useless grandstanding on the Feds' part.

The original deal, which would reportedly have spared the alleged attackers the death penalty, was criticised by some families of victims.

Of course. It's an election year. Can't be 'soft on terror'.

[-] Willy@sh.itjust.works 17 points 3 months ago

A lot of the families are for this deal, but it’s a hard sell politically so the trial will continue for many years to come. May never end.

Isn’t the death penalty federally postponed anyways

[-] hoch@lemmy.world -1 points 3 months ago

Why would you want to be soft on terror?

[-] funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works 1 points 3 months ago

it's a long-known irony that politicians who say they are "tough on X" simply mean they are using ill-considered rhetoric to launch ill-considered legislation, which has the opposite effect.

[-] treadful@lemmy.zip 20 points 3 months ago

So close to shutting Gitmo down...

[-] tyrant@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago

My understanding was these guys would still most likely be there for the rest of their lives with or without this deal.

[-] treadful@lemmy.zip 8 points 3 months ago

As I heard it, once the pleas go in the goal was to get them into the federal prison system for life sentences.

[-] IphtashuFitz@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago

I heard a report on the radio that a federal law was passed a while ago making it illegal to transfer prisoners from Gitmo to prisons within the US. These plea deals would have likeky meant the prisoners would live the rest of their lives in Gitmo, which they basically are anyway.

[-] Theharpyeagle@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago

NPR's Serial series had a great season about Gitmo. The last two episodes in particular discuss why this case has been drawn out so long. They also talk with a group of family members of victims who support the plea deal if only to get some closure via official statements from the detainees.

[-] Adderbox76@lemmy.ca 5 points 3 months ago

Wait what?! How the shit is this still working it's way through the system after 23 years?!

[-] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago

So they lied to force false confessions and proceed to execute them anyways?

[-] CoconutPetesPaella@lemmy.one 5 points 3 months ago

Anyone know what method of death penalty they would receive? Lethal injection? Hanging?

[-] PugJesus@lemmy.world 11 points 3 months ago

Feds do lethal injection, I believe.

[-] CoconutPetesPaella@lemmy.one 3 points 3 months ago

Is this federal? I thought it was military

[-] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 6 points 3 months ago

That's what changed: Austin changed it from military to federal in order to put murdering them back on the table.

[-] halykthered@lemmy.ml 4 points 3 months ago

Catapulted into the sun, I believe.

[-] Jesusaurus@lemmy.world 4 points 3 months ago

It's easier to catapult into Jupiter

[-] meco03211@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago

It's easier to catapult out of the solar system than into the sun.

[-] morphballganon@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago

Is it?

Couldn't we just shove them out of a plane flying over Idaho or something?

[-] MelodiousFunk@slrpnk.net 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

I think that might qualify as cool and unusual punishment.

[-] gnutrino@programming.dev 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

It's even easier to catapult into Venus.

[-] halcyoncmdr@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago

It's actually surprisingly really difficult to hit the Sun. Especially considering literally EVERYTHING in the Solar System is attracted to it.

[-] Draedron@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 3 months ago

What fuckers. Tortured them for years, then lied to them to stop torturing and not aiming to kill them.

[-] Snapz@lemmy.world -2 points 3 months ago

Who was the officer that originally made the plea deal, and without any white house involvement or even heads up it seems on what would obviously be an attention attracting action? With the general proximity to the election and after all this time they've been kicked top, timing feels deliberate to try to cause a difficult public moment for the administration?

Who is this person that approved the pleas originally and what's their background?

[-] jwt@programming.dev 5 points 3 months ago

It is mentioned in this article.

[-] Snapz@lemmy.world 0 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Sorry, was late, I missed that. Thanks

Okay, so a lot of layers here, but a few things stand out...

  • She was a retired Army lawyer that studied at Berkeley. Austin appointed her to replace trump appointee a year ago

  • The trump appointee had been instructed to seek pleas previously.

  • ACLU is on her side

  • Feels like news outlets intentionally focused on "plea deal" phrase alone, which many will likely immediately process as "release" instead of saying a firm guilty verdict that secures life in prison over the death penalty (especially reactive, vocal, co-opted 9/11 victims rights groups with trump flags on their trucks)

  • So timing feels either A) a dumb mistake when you could have pushed to after election with motions I imagine B) fear that dems wouldn't win the election and a new trump admin would execute or C) a very progressive prosecutor that is too idealistic, defiantly trying to make this a front and center election issue (even if it could have turned into a perceived trump strength for swing voters).

[-] TheDudeV2@lemmy.ca 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Thanks for providing this update. You added some sources and data that I didn't know, and your last point clearly articulates the set of likely causes of this misstep.

When I first became aware of this story my gut-reaction was "I fucking hate unforced errors like this!"; I'm now very curious why this happened the way it did. Mind you, in the grand scheme of things I suspect this is nothing more than a fleeting political blip.

[-] MediaBiasFactChecker@lemmy.world -4 points 3 months ago

BBC News Media Bias Fact Check Credibility: [High] (Click to view Full Report)

Name: BBC News Bias: Left-Center
Factual Reporting: High
Country: United Kingdom
Full Report: https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/bbc/

Check the bias and credibility of this article on Ground.News


Thanks to Media Bias Fact Check for their access to the API.
Please consider supporting them by donating.

Footer

Beep boop. This action was performed automatically. If you dont like me then please block me.💔
If you have any questions or comments about me, you can make a post to LW Support lemmy community.

this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2024
105 points (98.2% liked)

News

23296 readers
3410 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS