Padilla Trial to Go Forward

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Padilla Trial to Go Forward

Posted on Feb 28, 2007

Jose Padilla has been ruled competent to stand trial, a rebuke to his lawyers. The defense had sought to have him treated for PTSD before the trial began. Padilla has been held in isolation for three and a half years, during which time he was subjected to varying kinds of interrogation and, very likely, torture.

The judge was careful to note that her ruling did not address whether Padilla had been mistreated but said his condition did not prevent him from standing trial.

Reuters:

Former “enemy combatant” Jose Padilla is mentally competent to stand trial on terrorism charges, a U.S. judge ruled on Wednesday without addressing allegations that the al Qaeda suspect was mistreated in military custody.

The 36-year-old American citizen is scheduled to go to trial on April 16 on charges that he aided Islamist extremists and conspired with them to murder, kidnap and maim people overseas.

His lawyers argued that 3-1/2 years of secret detention and interrogation by the U.S. military had left Padilla too mentally impaired to help his lawyers defend him in court.

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By Quy Tran, March 1, 2007 at 10:54 am Link to this comment
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Just hang him high as we did to Saddam Hussein !

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By Jaded Prole, March 1, 2007 at 8:21 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Given the levels of competancy we are witnessing at the highest levels of government, the expectations of what defines competance have to be taken into consideration. I persoanlly hope Padilla is found innocent and sues for damages. No one deserves to be subject to the kind of mistreatment he has experianced.

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By DM, March 1, 2007 at 7:14 am Link to this comment
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Fine then ... let’s hope that the nature of his detention, the torture and the legal quasi-land in which he was held (a brig off the coast) are all discussed in open court. Then let the spin-off investigations and trials of the torturers begin ... hopefully all the way to the top of the Executive branch.

As for Padilla ... presumably the torture “evidence” will not be admissable and (like most of the Guantanamo prisoners and many if not most of those detained in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere) it will likely turn out that Padilla is an incredibly unlucky innocent man. If so, like the Canadian rendered to Syria, he is going to be due millions in reparations.

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