Posted on 01/14/2009 6:49:27 PM PST by markomalley
A 21-year-old citizen of Chad who has been held for seven years at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba must be released, a federal judge ruled on Wednesday.
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon said the government had not proven that Mohammed el Gharani was an enemy combatant and the detainee must be freed and sent home soon either to Saudi Arabia, where he was raised and his family lives, or Chad.
Leon's ruling comes just before President-elect Barack Obama, who has vowed to close the prison camp, takes office on Tuesday.
Since Obama's election in November, federal judges have speeded up case-by-case reviews of about 200 detainee legal challenges in the wake of a landmark Supreme Court ruling in June that gave Guantanamo Bay prisoners the legal right to challenge their confinement.
Gharani, also known as Yousuf Al Karany, was arrested in Pakistan in 2001 and taken to Guantanamo Bay in early 2002.
The U.S. government had said that Gharani -- who was 14 when he was arrested -- had stayed in an al Qaeda-affiliated guest house in Afghanistan, had fought in the battle of Tora Bora, had served as a courier for senior al Qaeda operatives and was a member of a London-based al Qaeda cell.
But Leon said the government could not prove any of the allegations. He said they relied mainly on information from two other detainees at Guantanamo Bay whose reliability and credibility was questionable.
(Excerpt) Read more at uk.reuters.com ...
I know a guy named Chad. I hope it wasn’t him.
I think we should hang the Chads.
He’ll be getting out just in time for Al Qaeda’s next big gig that Rimshot Joe Biden warned us about. What to go judgie!
Ol’ Judge Leon should be prepared to take delivery of this guy at his home.
under what authority?
So if he’s a nice guy, why does he have an alias?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.