Gitmo Judge Won't Quit Cole Bombing Case

The chief judge in the Guantanamo war crimes tribunal refused on Tuesday to step aside from the trial of a prisoner accused of orchestrating the suicide-bomb attack that killed 17 U.S. soldiers aboard the warship USS Cole in 2000.

The judge, Army Col. James Pohl, rejected defense arguments that the public might perceive him as biased towards protecting the U.S. government bureaucracy to preserve his own paycheck. He said they had shown no evidence of actual bias.

“"A reasonably informed observer in possession of all the facts would not question my impartiality," Pohl said.

Pohl's ruling came in the case of alleged al Qaeda chieftain Abd al Rahim al Nashiri, who is accused of selecting and directing the two suicide bombers who drove a boat full of explosives into the side of the Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden in October 2000.

The blast tore a hole in the warship's hull, killing 17 sailors and wounding dozens more. Nashiri, a 47-year-old Saudi of Yemeni descent, is charged with murder, attempted murder, conspiracy and terrorism. He faces the death penalty if convicted.

The case is expected to be the first capital case to go to trial in the special tribunals at the remote Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval base in eastern Cuba.

Defense attorney Rick Kammen argued unsuccessfully that Pohl had a financial interest that could affect his impartiality in the case.

 

The 61-year-old judge was recalled from retirement and his contract is subject to annual renewal in September. His $10,577 monthly pay would drop by about 20 percent if he returned to retirement.

“"I don't think anyone can dispute that 20 or 25 percent of a judge's income is significant," Kammen said.

As chief judge, Pohl has assigned himself to handle all of the cases brought so far against "“high-value" prisoners who were held in secret CIA prisons before being sent to Guantanamo in 2006.

He is presiding in the pending death-penalty case against five men charged with plotting the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States that killed 2,976 people.

He also oversaw the February guilty plea by Majid Khan, an al Qaeda money courier who is expected to testify as a prosecution witness in the 9/11 case.

Kammen said the cases were perceived by much of the general public as "“no-fail missions" where the tribunal must produce convictions in order to justify and conceal the alleged torture of the defendants while they were in CIA custody.

“"There's certainly a lot of the public who believe that the reason we're in Guantanamo is to keep things secret," Kammen said. "“The whole reason we're in Guantanamo is to protect intelligence officials. The whole reason we're in Guantanamo is to keep the truth from coming out."

He said the process might be perceived as more fair if more than one judge was involved.

"“When only one judge presides over all the cases, at best, your honor, what you have is a process that is only seen through one prism," Kammen argued.

"“Wouldn't we want it to be as vibrant as possible with as much robustness as possible? When only one judge makes the decision, that robustness, we suggest, is gone, and that undermines the legitimacy in this process," he said.

The prosecution characterized the defense argument as conjecture and innuendo lacking in legal basis and specific facts, and the judge concurred.