Federal Judge Orders 'Enemy Combatant' Jose Padilla Charged Or Released

Tyler Durden camera_lumina at hotmail.com
Tue Mar 1 08:20:52 PST 2005


What the hell. A federal judge finally did something that wasn't completely 
cowardly. I'm interested to see how the Bushites will try to subvert this 
situation anyway. Come to think of it, I'd bet they've been brainwashing 
Padilla to blow up something the day after he gets out so they can squelch 
the remaining democratic "loopholes".

-TD



>From: "R.A. Hettinga" <rah at shipwright.com>
>To: cypherpunks at al-qaeda.net
>Subject: Federal Judge Orders 'Enemy Combatant' Jose Padilla Charged Or   
>Released
>Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2005 21:15:44 -0500
>
><http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=401&u=/wews/20050228/lo_wyff/2605959&printer=1>
>
>Yahoo!
>
>Federal Judge Orders 'Enemy Combatant' Jose Padilla Charged Or Released
>
>
>Mon Feb 28, 6:08 PM ET
>
>
>  A federal judge in Spartanburg has ordered that an American citizen held
>as an enemy combatant in a Navy brig in Charleston should be released.
>
>
>
>
>  U.S. District Judge Henry F. Floyd ruled Monday that the president of the
>United States does not have the authority to order Jose Padilla to be held.
>
>  "If the law in its current state is found by the president to be
>insufficient to protect this country from terrorist plots, such as the one
>alleged here, then the president should prevail upon Congress to remedy the
>problem," he wrote.
>
>  In the ruling, Floyd said that three court cases that the government used
>to make its claim did not sufficiently apply to Padilla's case.
>
>  Floyd wrote that, in essence, "the detention of a United States citizen 
>by
>the military is disallowed without explicit Congressional authorization."
>
>  Floyd wrote that because the government had not provided any proof that
>the president has the power to hold Padilla, he must reject the
>government's claim of authority.
>
>  "To do otherwise would not only offend the rule of law and violate this
>countrys constitutional tradition, but it would also be a betrayal of this
>nations commitment to the separation of powers that safeguards our
>democratic values and individual liberties," he wrote.
>
>  "For the court to find for [the U.S. government] would also be to engage
>in judicial activism. This court sits to interpret the law as it is and not
>as the court might wish it to be. Pursuant to its interpretation, the court
>finds that the President has no power, neither express nor implied, neither
>constitutional nor statutory, to hold [Padilla] as an enemy combatant,"
>Floyd wrote.
>
>  As a result, Floyd ordered that Padilla be charged with a crime or
>released within 45 days.
>
>  The government is expected to appeal the decision.
>
>--
>-----------------
>R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
>The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
>44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
>"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
>[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
>experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'





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