Lawyers for the alleged conspirators behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's move to revoke their plea deal, sparing them the death penalty, violated military regulations, according to CNN.
"We have had an unprecedented act by a government official to pull back what was a valid agreement. For us, it raises very serious questions about continuing to engage in a system that seems so obviously corrupt and rigged," Walter Ruiz, defense counsel for Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi, said during a hearing at Guantanamo on Wednesday.
A military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, announced that the official appointed to oversee the war court, retired Brig. Gen. Susan Escallier, had reached plea deals with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and accused accomplices Walid bin Attash and al-Hawsawi.
The plea bargain sparked outrage among lawmakers and 9/11 survivors and the families of victims, promoting Austin to later withdraw it.
The defense has argued that Austin withdrawing the plea deal violated the military's Manual for Military Commission, CNN reported. Austin defended his decision, saying the American people deserved to see the defendants put on trial.
"I'm deeply mindful of my duty to all those whose lives were lost or changed forever on 9/11, and I fully understand that no measure of justice can ever make up for their loss. So this wasn't a decision that I took lightly," Austin said.
The U.S. military commission overseeing the cases of five defendants in the Sept. 11 attacks has been stuck in pre-trial hearings and other preliminary court action since 2008.
The alleged torture that the defendants underwent while in CIA custody has been among the challenges slowing the cases, and left the prospect of full trials and verdicts still uncertain, in part because of the inadmissibility of evidence linked to the torture.
Lawyers for the two sides have been exploring a negotiated resolution to the case for about 1½ years. President Joe Biden blocked an earlier proposed plea bargain in the case last year, when he refused to offer requested presidential guarantees that the men would be spared solitary confinement and provided trauma care for the torture they underwent while in CIA custody.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.
Sam Barron ✉
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