You Don't Need No Stinkin' Trial!
Could the President of the United States ever argue that he has the power and the right – and even the duty – to take any American citizens into custody he chooses, throw them into prison forever, torture them at will, and never even charge them with a crime?
The question has long been moot. It has already happened.
Meet Jose Padilla.
Born in Brooklyn, New York, Padilla was apprehended at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport in May 2002 and has been in custody ever since. And he has neither received a trial nor has he even been charged with a crime. That’s more than three years in prison without a trial, or even a criminal charge, for those of you counting.
Not only has he never even been charged with a crime, Bush Administration officials have argued in court he has no right to see an attorney and that the administration can hold him in prison interrogations forever. Forever.
By the way, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the second district ordered that he be given a trial back in December 2003, and the administration has done nothing.
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