WASHINGTON, 6 January 2006 — The US Supreme Court agreed Wednesday to allow the military transfer of accused “enemy combatant” Jose Padilla to Miami, Florida to face criminal charges. The case is viewed here as the highest profile criminal case the government has pursued in the “war on terror” since the prosecution of Zacarias Moussaoui for an alleged role in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, The decision is viewed as a small victory for the Bush Administration, as the justices voted to overrule a lower court — after an embarrassing rebuff by a usually friendly federal appeals court refused to permit Padilla’s transfer.
The Supreme Court said it would decide later whether to consider the inmate’s argument that President Bush overstepped his authority by ordering Padilla’s indefinite detention in 2002. The government revealed Tuesday that President Bush signed a memo last November 20 to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld saying it would be in the government’s interest to turn him over to the Justice Department for criminal proceedings.
Padilla’s jailing as an enemy combatant for the past 3 ½ years has been the subject of multiple court rulings and criticism by liberal groups. The court’s order means that Padilla will be held in a federal prison in Miami rather than a Navy brig in Charleston, South Carolina, while he waits to learn whether the justices will take up his appeal of a decision that upheld, in sweeping terms, the government’s authority to keep citizens it designates enemy combatants in open-ended military confinement. Padilla’s lawyers argue that the indictment has not made his appeal invalid because the Administration has not withdrawn his designation as an enemy combatant and has not foreclosed the prospect of sending him back to military detention if he is acquitted in a civilian trial.
The former Chicago gang member and Muslim convert was arrested at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport and put in military custody, where he was held without charges and traditional legal rights.
The Administration is arguing that his appeal has been rendered invalid by the government’s decision to try him on terrorism charges in the Federal District Court in Miami, where he was indicted by a grand jury on Nov. 17.
The criminal charges do not involve accusations made by the Administration since 2002 — that Padilla was part of an Al-Qaeda-backed plot to blow up apartment buildings. Instead, a grand jury charged Padilla with being part of a North American terrorism cell that raised funds and recruited fighters to wage a violent jihad outside the United States.
The indictment involved a new set of charges that placed Padilla on an existing criminal case in Florida against Adham Hassoun, Mohomed Youssef and Kifah Jayyousi, accused of terrorism-related crimes. Besides adding Padilla, the indictment also named a Canadian national, Kassem Daher.
“All of these defendants,” Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales at a press conference said, “are alleged members of a violent terrorist support cell that operated in the United States and Canada....As alleged in the indictment, this cell supported terrorists by sending money, physical assets, and new recruits to overseas jihad conflicts. These defendants also took steps to disguise their fundraising and recruitment activities by speaking in code and using non-governmental organizations as a front for illegitimate activities.” A conviction of the charges could lead to a life prison sentence.
The Supreme Court’s unsigned one-page order reviewed the recent history of the case and concluded by noting only that the court would consider Padilla’s pending petition “in due course.” That petition, seeking review of a federal appeals court decision that upheld the government’s authority to keep Padilla in open-ended military detention as an enemy combatant, is scheduled to go before the justices at their closed-door conference on Jan. 13.
