WASHINGTON, 1 February 2005 — A federal judge ruled yesterday that foreign terror suspects detained overseas by the US government can challenge their imprisonment in US courts. The judge also criticized the Bush Administration for holding hundreds of people without legal representation.
Judge Joyce Hens Green, handling claims filed by over 50 prisoners at the US Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, said the Supreme Court made clear last year that they have constitutional rights that lower courts should enforce.
Green also ruled that hearings set up by the government to determine if the prisoners are “enemy combatants” are unconstitutional. Those hearings, called Combatant Status Review Tribunals, have been criticized by civil rights groups who say detainees are not represented by lawyers and have few legal rights.
The decision conflicts with a ruling two weeks ago by another federal judge in the same court who dealt with a similar lawsuit by a different group of detainees. US District Judge Richard Leon said last year’s Supreme Court ruling did not provide Guantanamo detainees the legal basis to try to win their freedom in American courts.
Judge Green disagreed, saying detainees may fight their indefinite detentions as a violation of their constitutional due process rights. Some also may have claims that their rights were violated under the Geneva Convention, she said.
“It was inevitable that a court was going to rule this way, just as it was inevitable that another court ruled the other way two weeks ago. It’s simply a huge legal mess,” said Dan Benjamin, a terrorism expert at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.
