Accused 9/11 Mastermind Seeks Access to Secret Testimony

GUANTÁNAMO BAY, Cuba — A defence lawyer connected Wednesday invoked the bedrock American close to face one’s accuser arsenic helium asked a subject justice to licence the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to be concealed grounds by 2 psychologists who waterboarded him 183 times.

The statement illustrates the on-again, off-again quality of the warfare crimes proceedings, whose rules mostly exclude the defendants from classified grounds successful the pretrial phase.

The psychologists, some erstwhile C.I.A. contractors, began testifying successful unfastened tribunal successful January 2020. But their instrumentality to tribunal to resume testifying has been connected clasp successful portion due to the fact that the justice who heard it abruptly announced his status 2 months later, and successful portion due to the fact that the pandemic paralyzed the proceedings for much than 500 days.

The overarching issues are whether admissions that the suspect successful this case, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, made years aft the waterboarding were tainted by torture, and whether they tin beryllium utilized arsenic cardinal grounds successful an eventual trial.

The psychologists, James E. Mitchell and John Bruce Jessen, were called to picture their usage of “enhanced interrogation techniques” — which included waterboarding, bashing a prisoner’s caput into a wall, utmost isolation, slumber deprivation and forced nudity — successful a concealed overseas C.I.A. situation web successful 2002 and 2003 to “condition,” arsenic Dr. Mitchell testified, captives to reply questions connected demand.

Dr. Mitchell said that the defendants had gained their escaped volition by the clip they were questioned by FBI agents astatine Guantánamo Bay successful 2007. The scientist testified that adjacent earlier Guantánamo, Dr. Mitchell and Mr. Mohammed would astatine times sit unneurotic and chat portion holding hands, arsenic Middle Eastern men sometimes do.

Defense lawyers reason that the five defendants successful the case were inactive truthful fearful that they could beryllium tortured again that they told FBI interrogators astatine Guantánamo Bay what the C.I.A. conditioned them to say. They person asked the justice to exclude the interrogations arsenic the merchandise of systematic U.S. authorities abuse.

In the abbreviated term, the question is whether Mr. Mohammed tin ticker erstwhile Dr. Mitchell returns to the tribunal to attest successful a closed nationalist information session. No day for that league has been set.

Defense lawyers besides reason that, due to the fact that this is simply a decease punishment case, the defendants are entitled to greater protections, including the close to be concealed grounds astir which they mightiness person knowledge. Prosecutors reason nationalist information is astatine involvement due to the fact that the C.I.A. inactive retains definite secrets astir its overseas achromatic tract program, which began successful 2002 and ended successful 2009.

The judge, Col. Matthew N. McCall of the Air Force, inherited the question from his predecessor, Col. W. Shane Cohen, who abruptly retired aft Dr. Mitchell testified successful unfastened tribunal crossed 9 days successful January 2020, and Dr. Jessen for one.

A prosecutor, Maj. Jackson T. Hall of the Air Force, said a idiosyncratic indispensable person a information clearance to be a classified warfare tribunal session, meaning some the nationalist and the defendants are barred. He cited conscionable 1 objection — an accused violent tin perceive the classified accusation if it is thing that the accused violent said.

He added that erstwhile subject judges had excluded the defendants from classified pretrial hearings for the past 7 years, and urged Colonel McCall not to deviate from that practice.

Major Hall accused defence lawyers of engaging successful “graymail,” fundamentally arguing that, successful bid to execute a just trial, the authorities had to take betwixt disclosing authorities secrets oregon being sanctioned by the judge, perchance including a dismissal of the case.

Mr. Mohammed’s lawyer, Gary D. Sowards, said his squad needed the suspect successful tribunal to perceive concealed grounds astir the C.I.A. achromatic tract programme — and the psychologists’ relation successful it — to usher their questioning of the men, based connected Mr. Mohammed’s acquisition arsenic a captive of what helium called the “international gulag archipelago of torture chambers” from March 2003 to September 2006.

“Mr. Mohammed already knows astir the grisly details of his torture and what happened to him,” Mr. Sowards said. “That’s what we’re talking about.”

Major Hall cited a akin exclusion successful the national proceedings from 2002 to 2006 against Zacarias Moussaoui, an admitted aspiring hijacker successful the Sept. 11 attacks. During a play erstwhile helium represented himself, the authoritative said, Mr. Moussaoui was denied entree to classified accusation that was favorable to his defense. In that example, helium said, Mr. Moussaoui had a standby counsel who could spot the classified accusation but not archer the suspect astir it.

Mr. Sowards said the request for Mr. Mohammed to perceive the grounds unrecorded was made wide aft the suspect was excluded from the deposition of a erstwhile C.I.A. interpreter who lied astir his inheritance and ended up moving for a defence team. The defendants successful the lawsuit recognized the interpreter astatine a tribunal session successful 2015, and past exposed his anterior clandestine presumption successful unfastened court.

Upon reviewing his testimony, Mr. Sowards said, Mr. Mohammed took contented with respective of the interpreter’s statements but defence lawyers were incapable to situation him connected the spot. Instead, Mr. Sowards said, defence lawyers were debating whether to question to reopen the interpreter’s deposition to effort to impeach him.

No day has been acceptable for the existent commencement of the proceedings of Mr. Mohammed and 4 different men who are accused of conspiring successful the 2001 attacks that killed astir 3,000 radical erstwhile terrorists piloted hijacked commercialized planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field.