BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: pdq
Date: 07 Feb 08 - 11:24 AM

polaitaly:

In the US, prosecutors usually file higher charges, then allow the charged to plead down. If the result is a coviction for the correct level of crime, they did his job.

"the death penalty for juveniles is been abolished in the USA " and "he can't be executed".

Well, I think we need a lawyer for these. Many LA steet gang thugs are sent out at about 14 to kill their rivals. They are told they get one "free one" at that age. However, by the time the killer get near the injection table, it will 10 or more years due to automatic appeals and various stays of execution. We have many legal groups who do little else but file such appeals.

Also, I think the definition of 'juvenile' has been adjusted in the legislation you mentioned. I'm sure a 17 year old could be executed.

Still more, this is a military tribunal and is probably not resicted by the recent law you mention.

"In 2006, the US Congress passed the Military Commission Act"
You should have no trouble finding the text to this act on the net. You may choose to read it.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: polaitaly
Date: 07 Feb 08 - 03:37 AM

I can't understand. There was a war: the boy was fighting and killed a man: how can this be a "war crime"? If so, all the U.S. soldiers who were fighing with him who happened to kill all the people in the place , and all the Taliban soldiers in all Afganistan too, are guilty of war crimes.... Anyway, pdq, if I'm not wrong the death penalty for juveniles is been abolished in the USA . So I hope he can't be executed.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 06 Feb 08 - 10:13 PM

Tonight on the CBC radio news, they played a clip of an interview with the commanding officer who had been on the scene, supposedly - he had been on As It Happens (CBC radio show) a year or two ago giving the official story, as he had witnessed it, so he had said - now he admits that, well, he had not actually SEEN what had happened; it was the way it had been told to him by those who were a little closer to the action, blah, blah, blah ...

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 06 Feb 08 - 09:37 PM

Sure is quiet on this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: meself
Date: 06 Feb 08 - 12:05 AM

"who kills an American soldier"

ALLEGEDLY kills - part of the significance of this 'classified' document is that it does not jibe with the story put out by the Pentagon/Prosecution for five years now (sorry, no source - I've heard it over and over on the radio): the fighting had stopped, the soldiers went in, all the enemy were dead - except for Khadr, as it turned out, who jumped up and threw a hand-grenade which killed the medical officer, then Khadr was captured. This document indicates that in actuality, the fighting was still going on, no one saw who threw the grenade, Khadr was found sitting, facing away from the fighting, was then shot twice in the back ...

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 09:01 PM

Now let's just think.

Here, a non-american is being charged with "war crimes" not even in a properly constituted American court, but in a kangaroo court recognised by all independent legal commentators to be illegal, run by and for the forces a member of which it is alleged he killed (when fighting for a country the Americans bombed back into the stone age).

But America has refused to accept the jurisdiction of any international court (not the local courts of the victim countries, less still the properly constituted military courts of the victim countries, nor indeed any specially constituted illegal courts) over alleged war crimes by American forces.

This is not even handed. Fighting on the losing side is not a war crime.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:45 PM

Thing is, the kid was brainwashed, and a light rinse would have sufficed.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:44 PM

Bingo, Sandy.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:43 PM

It's hard to find much sympathy in my heart for him but I think that our government should be protesting him being held and tried in Cuba. If there are legitimate charges that the Americans can lay against him let them do so in the USA. If he is guilty then prove it in a reputable court of law.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:41 PM

Background to PDQ's post.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:38 PM

I can't get an answer about that. Stone silence to my e-mail requests.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: pdq
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:38 PM

In 2006, the US Congress passed the Military Commission Act which made it clear who has jusidiction over unlawful enemy combatants. Khadr is being tried by a military judge in a military court building on a military base, Guantanamo.

Like it or not, the Afghanistan War is a NATO operation with full participation of Great Britian, Canada and the United States. The UN Security Counsil did vote vote their support directly, but they sent a fair number of aid workers to assist.

The US has every right to try, convict and even execute a Canadian citizen (civilian) who kills an American soldier. It is not as if the Canadian government or the news media don't know about the trial. The man killed was a medic, by the way.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:37 PM

So did the Canadian government request that their boy should be held and eventually sort of tried by the Americans?

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:31 PM

Sorry, meself. Cross posted with you.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: meself
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:29 PM

From what I understand: because when by the time he was 13 or 14, his father had convinced him it would be a good idea. By the time he was 15, he hadn't yet figured out that it wasn't such a good idea, apparently.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:27 PM

The kids was raised by his parents who were not wrapped too tight. He was 15 years old at the time.

"His name was Omar Khadr. Born into a fundamentalist Muslim family in Toronto, he had been prepared for jihad since he was a small boy. His parents, who were Egyptian and Palestinian, had raised him to believe that religious martyrdom was the highest achievement he could aspire to. In the Khadr family, suicide bombers were spoken of with great respect."

from

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/11128331/follow_omar_khadr_from_an_al_qaeda_childhood_to_a_gitmo_cell

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: artbrooks
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 07:15 PM

I guess that is a good question. Another, equally good, one would be why a Canadian citizen was fighting for the Taliban in Afghanistan?

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: Peace
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 06:29 PM

I asked my government exactly that and received no answer.

Subject: RE: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 06:28 PM

Why is a Canadian citizen being "tried" for an alleged war crime in Afghanistan in an American court anyway?

Subject: BS: Omar Khadr: prosecution gaffe
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 05 Feb 08 - 06:10 PM

Interesting classified document - eyewitness account - inadvertently made public.