Rights? You want rights?

[spindrifter]

NYT: White House Bill Proposes System to Try Detainees

By DAVID S. CLOUD and SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
Published: July 26, 2006

WASHINGTON, July 25 — Legislation drafted by the Bush administration setting out new rules on bringing terror detainees to trial would allow hearsay evidence to be introduced unless it was deemed “unreliable” and would permit defendants to be excluded from their own trials if necessary to protect national security, according to a copy of the proposal.

<snip>

The 32-page bill preserves the idea of using military commissions to prosecute terror suspects and makes modest changes in their procedural rules, including several expanded protections for defendants, many of them drawn from the military’s legal code. But the proposal also sets up a possible confrontation with lawmakers who have called for modeling the trials on the military’s rules for courts-martial, which would allow defendants more rights.

The draft measure describes court-martial procedure as “not practicable in trying enemy combatants” because doing so would “require the government to share classified information” and would exclude “hearsay evidence determined to be probative and reliable.”

<big snip>

Rather than requiring a speedy trial for enemy combatants, the draft proposal says they “may be tried and punished at any time without limitations.” Defendants could be held until hostilities end, even if found not guilty by a commission.

<more>

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/26/washington/26detain.html?hp&ex=1153886400&en=de92570c45b40082&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[blonndee]

1. Who exactly qualifies as a "terror detainee"?

Not that anyone should have more rights than anyone else, but this could be REALLY bad for any one of us here. "Hearsay." Sounds like a potential for Hoover's ridiculous files and McCarthyism all over again, but much more scary.

Am I just being paranoid? Sometimes that happens when I've been on the internets too long. :tinfoilhat:

[spindrifter]

2. No, I don't think you are being paranoid.

BushCo people should not be allowed within a light year of determining any process for "trying" people they allege are "terror detainees" or any other variation on it. They have demonstrated time and time again that they have no fundamental understanding of the justice system--whether it is military or civilian. Who is going to determine whether the "hearsay" is reliable--THEY will. They are not to be trusted, as we all know.

[jayctravis]

3. You know, they're awful picky about keeping state secrets...

UNLESS IT INVOLVES OUTING VALERIE PLAME!

Dammit, this just so edges into BRAZIL (the movie) territory that it's giving me the creeps. You can't be at your own trial because the trial may contain stuff you're not supposed to know about? Gaaaah!