Federal Judiciary

Detainee’s release ordered

By Akin Gump Supreme Court Practice Group

In the first Guantanamo Bay prisoner case where detention was based primarily upon claims of other detainees, U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon on Wednesday found those claims unreliable and so ordered the release of a Saudi Arabian who is a citizen of Chad — Mohammed El Gharani (who also uses the name Yousuf Al Karany).  The judge’s 11-page ruling is here.

Al Gharani was 14 years old when he was captured in Pakistan some seven years ago.  He has been at Guantanmo since then.  The U.S. government, in Judge Leon’s court, had relied mainly upon statements from two other Guantanamo prisoners who claimed that Al Gharani had stayed at a guesthouse in Afghanistan that was affiliated with the Al Qaeda terrorist network, had been trained at Al Qaeda military camps, had fought against U.S. and allied forces at a battle at Tora Bora in Afghanistan, and was a member of a terrorist cell in London.

Each of those contentions came from other detainees, Judge Leon said, and the judge found the statements inconsistent or unverified, and had no support from other evidence.

The judge also rejected a separate government claim, based on unrevealed classified information, that Al Gharani had served as a courier for several high-ranking Al
Qaeda members.  This information, Leon found, was “woefully deficient.”

All in all, the judge said, “a mosaic of tiles bearing images this murky reveals nothing about [Al Gharani] with sufficient clarity, individually or collectively, that can be relied upon by this Court.”  He ordered the prisoner released, with the government under a duty to make the arrangements “forthwith.”

Judge Leon, who is moving more rapidly than other District judges on detainee cases, has now ordered the release of six prisoners and the continued detention of three others.

Full post as published by SCOTUSBLOG on January 14, 2009 (boomark / email).