José Padilla Convicted – update

From the New York Times:

When Mr. Padilla was arrested in 2002, the government said he was an Al Qaeda operative who had plotted to detonate a radioactive dirty bomb inside the United States. Mr. Padilla, who is an American citizen, should have been charged as a criminal and put on trial in a civilian court. Instead, President Bush declared him an “enemy combatant” and kept him in a Navy brig for more than three years.

The administration’s insistence that it had the right to hold Mr. Padilla indefinitely – simply on the president’s word – was its first outrageous act in the case, but hardly its last. Mr. Padilla was kept in a small isolation cell, and when he left that cell he was blindfolded and his ears were covered. He was denied access to a lawyer even when he was being questioned.

Then the NYT says:

After all that, there was still some good news yesterday: a would-be terrorist will be going to jail. …

…and on what evidence? And after 3 years of imprisonment without habeas corpus rights…and with the judge in the case ruling out even bringing up the subject of his (mis)treatment …even though this man was a citizen??? This is good news?
Read the complete article at:
The Padilla Conviction

José Padilla and two others convicted

Their case may have been fundamentally weak, but federal prosecutors managed to get José Padilla convicted. Padilla’s attorneys have alleged that their client was held “in a 9-by-7-foot cell, isolated for days or weeks at a time, and physically assaulted and threatened with execution and other violence, kept awake with lights and noises, and forced to take mind-altering drugs, possibly PCP or LSD.”

In case you missed it, here’s the link to an article describing how Padilla was escorted to visit to the dentist. Another video showing how he was interrogated has conveniently been reported missing by the government.

What has happened to America?