Latest / Brian Thomas / Judge Napolitano - Torture and Gitmo

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Judge Napolitano - Torture and Gitmo · Brian Thomas

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  Speaker 1: The talk station.
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  Speaker 2: Hey thirty one fifty five care see de talk station.
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  Speaker 2: Love this time of the week. Get to hear from
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  Speaker 2: Judge Annapolitano. Judging Freedom is his podcast, follow him where
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  Speaker 2: you get your podcasts. We'll deal with his subject matter
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  Speaker 2: for on today's Judging Freedom late at the end of
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  Speaker 2: the segment, as we always do, but in the meantime,
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  Speaker 2: welcome back, Judge Edna Polatano. Always a pleasure of having
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  Speaker 2: you on the program, and it was with great horror
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  Speaker 2: I read your column Gitmo and Torture revisited, sort of
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  Speaker 2: a painful to deal with recap of the fifteenth year
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  Speaker 2: of the prosecution of colleague Shaik Muhammed and going into this, Judge,
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  Speaker 2: it's kind of my response to you, and my emails suggested.
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  Speaker 2: You know, I know there are people out in the
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  Speaker 2: world because I've talked to so many of them. Screw
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  Speaker 2: that guy. He's a terrorist, he hates America. I don't
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  Speaker 2: care what they did to him. He deserves whatever he got.
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  Speaker 2: But it's bigger and more more important than that. And
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  Speaker 2: who among us would not say whatever our torturers wanted
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  Speaker 2: us to say if we were being subjected to the
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  Speaker 2: kind of violence this man was subjected to I just
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  Speaker 2: sign up to uninform whatever the look, Brian, this is
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  Speaker 2: what we're going to do to you over the next
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  Speaker 2: several years. If you don't tell us what we want
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  Speaker 2: I find tell me what you want me to tell you,
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  Speaker 2: I'll sign. That's what happens with torture. I mean, apostle
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  Speaker 2: Peter denied Jesus Christ three times. They didn't even torture him.
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  Speaker 2: He just knew his life was in jeopardy because of
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  Speaker 2: the Romans.
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  Speaker 3: The ex CIA agents and other government officials who have
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  Speaker 3: participated in and orchestrated torture, as well as some of
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  Speaker 3: the psychologists who have devised it, have said the exact
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  Speaker 3: same thing that you did. After a while, the victim
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  Speaker 3: tells the tortures whatever he or she thinks they want
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  Speaker 3: to hear, and it often doesn't correspond with reality. In
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  Speaker 3: this case, the torture went on for three years, and
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  Speaker 3: then there were admissions. Then there was in Guantanamo Bay
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  Speaker 3: a second set of interrogators who did not torture FBI,
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  Speaker 3: as well as military and US intelligence, and again there
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  Speaker 3: were admissions. So the argument is, was his personal will
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  Speaker 3: so attenuated, was his fear of the power of interrogators
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  Speaker 3: so extraordinary that he would tell the second set what
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  Speaker 3: he thought they wanted to hear. That's the issue before
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  Speaker 3: this judge. The whole prosecution is a serious stain on
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  Speaker 3: the American judicial system because Lindsey Graham talked George W.
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  Speaker 3: Bush into making this a military prosecution. If this had
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  Speaker 3: been a criminal prosecution in Lower Manhattan, in Federal Court,
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  Speaker 3: which is the principal place where the attacks occurred, where
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  Speaker 3: the world trade towers were, this case would have been
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  Speaker 3: resolved many, many years ago. But here we are fifteen
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  Speaker 3: years of litigation, five judges, forty four thousand pages of
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  Speaker 3: documents for the newest judge to review, and no trial
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  Speaker 3: date set yet where he's on his sixth set of prosecutors.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, this is just a monstrosity from the point
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  Speaker 3: of view of American justice. And I understand the argument
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  Speaker 3: of your great listeners, who have such antipathy towards anybody
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  Speaker 3: that would do what he admitted to doing. But if
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  Speaker 3: you allow the government the slightest opening, if you allow
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  Speaker 3: the government to get away with torture and denying due
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  Speaker 3: process in one instance, they'll drive a truck through it,
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  Speaker 3: and you never know who that truck will.
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  Speaker 2: Hit right going back to you know again, if I
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  Speaker 2: was arrested by some government who headed out for me
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  Speaker 2: and let me just put ourselves in the end, the
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  Speaker 2: situation of maybe a January sixth protester, Oh, they weren't
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  Speaker 2: pre they were just doing whatever. The point being, a
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  Speaker 2: lot of them got arrested, a lot of them. People
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  Speaker 2: feel that they were ill treated. But if they subjected
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  Speaker 2: the January sixth protester to this type of torture, which
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  Speaker 2: I think needs to be explained, because the original torture,
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  Speaker 2: as you boy, as you as you explained, waterboard one
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  Speaker 2: hundred and eighty three times, hung by his wrist while
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  Speaker 2: naked in a well lit walk in refrigerator where he
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  Speaker 2: was freezing and couldn't sleep for days, head smashed repeatedly
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  Speaker 2: against wooden walls, his rectum through which he was fed
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  Speaker 2: so brutalized that he bled for months, often ingesting into
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  Speaker 2: his intestines, his own blood and fecal material. That's round one.
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  Speaker 2: And then they bring about and they say, well, you're
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  Speaker 2: gonna get round two unless you tell the judge that
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  Speaker 2: you weren't tortured. Is that the setup for.
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  Speaker 1: This, Yes, you bet. It's a setup for this.
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  Speaker 3: It was so repellent that two sets of prosecutors ago,
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  Speaker 3: not the current prosecutors, but their predecessors, initiated plead agreements.
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  Speaker 3: The prosecutors said the defense Council, now that we know
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  Speaker 3: everything that happened to this guy, we can't ethically defend
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  Speaker 3: this in a public courtroom.
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  Speaker 1: Or when we go back to the US, we.
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  Speaker 3: Won't have our because this is happening in Cuba, we
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  Speaker 3: won't have our licenses to practice law. So the government
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  Speaker 3: initiates plea agreements. A plea agreement is entered into, it's
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  Speaker 3: agreed to by defense Council, it's agreed to by the defendants.
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  Speaker 3: It's agreed to by the prosecutors. It's agreed to by
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  Speaker 3: the General and the Pentagon supervising all the prosecutions. There
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  Speaker 3: are many prosecutions going on at Gitto. This is just
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  Speaker 3: the most notorious one, and it's agreed to by the
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  Speaker 3: trial judge. Then the Secretary of Defense says, I don't
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  Speaker 3: agree fires the General who agreed. He withdraws the Pentagon's approval.
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  Speaker 3: The trial judge says, too little, too late, Secretary of Austin.
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  Speaker 3: The trial judge is reversed by an appellate court, which
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  Speaker 3: says Austin has the final say.
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  Speaker 1: It's not too little, too late.
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  Speaker 3: The trial judge resigns, the prosecutors are resigned, A new
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  Speaker 3: prosecutorial team comes in, a new trial judge comes in.
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  Speaker 3: That judge spends a year reading forty four thousand pages
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  Speaker 3: of documents.
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  Speaker 1: You can't make this up. Brian and announced.
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  Speaker 3: This week he's going to rule this summer on whether
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  Speaker 3: the confession made to the second team of interrogators, the
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  Speaker 3: ones that threatened a torture but didn't actually torture, can
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  Speaker 3: be read to the jury.
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  Speaker 1: Can That's where we.
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  Speaker 2: Are in that particular hearing, and in considering that ruling
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  Speaker 2: ken the court. Is the court going to be privy
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  Speaker 2: to the torture he went through in the first round,
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  Speaker 2: which certainly had an influence on this man in dealing
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  Speaker 2: with the second inquiry because he knew what was coming
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  Speaker 2: his way if he didn't concede.
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  Speaker 1: Yes.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, this trial judge before he can rule, has to
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  Speaker 3: read everything. His predecessor is immediate predecessor, the one who
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  Speaker 3: signed off on the guilty plea held hours and hours
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  Speaker 3: of testimony from the defendants themselves, from government psychiatrists, and
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  Speaker 3: from a defense psychiatrists.
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  Speaker 1: About the effect of torture.
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  Speaker 3: Even the government psychiatrists admitted that the effect of brutalizing
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  Speaker 3: torture can be so extreme that the victim will tell
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  Speaker 3: anybody from his cellmate to the person bringing him food,
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  Speaker 3: to his wife on the phone, anybody what he thinks
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  Speaker 3: they want to hear, because of the horrific fear of
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  Speaker 3: going through the torture. Again, what's interesting here is the
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  Speaker 3: second set of interrogators was led by an FBI agent
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  Speaker 3: with thirty years experience. Did he read these people?
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  Speaker 1: They're Miranda warnings?
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  Speaker 3: He forgot now in a police station. That's the end
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  Speaker 3: of it. It is you don't read the Miranda warnings.
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  Speaker 3: No matter what the defendant says, that jury doesn't hear it.
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  Speaker 2: And none of this evidence would be interest in a
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  Speaker 2: criminal court in the United States because it's you know
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  Speaker 2: that old the way you boiled inn is like fruit
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  Speaker 2: of the poisonous tree. You can't beat a confession out
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  Speaker 2: of a person and have that confession be admissible, like
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  Speaker 2: you can't kick in a door without a warrant, Grab
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  Speaker 2: evidence and presented in court because it will be suppressed
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  Speaker 2: because you violated the constitutional rights of the owner of
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  Speaker 2: the home whose door you kicked in. None of those
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  Speaker 2: would be admissible, meaning they wouldn't have a case.
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  Speaker 3: Correct, theoretically, the same laws are applying here. But you know,
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  Speaker 3: military justice is to justices, military music is to music.
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  Speaker 3: This is just taking forever, in part because of the
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  Speaker 3: military procedure that no judge can stay for longer than
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  Speaker 3: three years. It's time for him to get promoted or retired.
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  Speaker 3: Great Lindsey Graham forgot to tell that to George Bush
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  Speaker 3: when they set up this system.
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  Speaker 2: What a bizarre law. Of course, that sounds like something
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  Speaker 2: was created in order to allow this to happen. It's
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  Speaker 2: like people over at the CIA who won't produce documents
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  Speaker 2: even though they've been ordered by law to produce them.
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  Speaker 2: They wait around for another administration and then the issue
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  Speaker 2: sort of goes away. Just wait for the next administration
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  Speaker 2: and we won't have to deal with the problem we're
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  Speaker 2: presented with right now. It's like waiting around. It's like
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  Speaker 2: a battle of attrition three years for a judge in
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  Speaker 2: a complex case like this, When it takes about three
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  Speaker 2: years to get up to speed in order to even
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  Speaker 2: hear the case, there's something fundamentally wrong with that, your honor, I'll.
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  Speaker 3: To make matters even worse. When the defendants told their
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  Speaker 3: lawyers that they believed the torture was videotape, the defendants
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  Speaker 3: subpoened the tapes.
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  Speaker 1: They disappeared, They disappeared.
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  Speaker 2: That never happens. That never happens, your honor. Nothing to
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  Speaker 2: see here. So if you had to guess, I know
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  Speaker 2: how Judge ended of Paulatano would rule in that case
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  Speaker 2: if you're the military tribunal judge. But what do you
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  Speaker 2: anticipate this judge is going to do in resolving this
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  Speaker 2: just a tea leaf freeing ask, I think.
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  Speaker 1: He's going to suppress the evidence.
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  Speaker 3: And before your viewers start throwing eggs at the screen,
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  Speaker 3: there is much evidence of his guilt lawfully obtained. The
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  Speaker 3: government doesn't even need these confessions in order to convict,
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  Speaker 3: but the government wants to use them just because that's
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  Speaker 3: the way the government is.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, And I appreciate you bringing that back up, because
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  Speaker 2: that point serves as the predicate for why so many
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  Speaker 2: people would say, well, screw this guy, he's a terrorist.
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  Speaker 2: I don't care what they do to him. But again,
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  Speaker 2: we're talking about torture here, and when you put it
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  Speaker 2: out and beyond its confines. In this situation, any government
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  Speaker 2: would do it like they play fast and lose with
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  Speaker 2: everything anymore. We don't want this going on, so we
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  Speaker 2: will figure out only fifteen years later to finally going
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  Speaker 2: to get an answer to the question. Judgennapolitano, Judging Freedom
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  Speaker 2: is your podcast. Who are you going to be speaking
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  Speaker 2: with today?
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: I have Aaron mante Pepe Escobar from the Saint Petersburg
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: Economic Forum in Saint Petersburg, Moscow, May Johnson who says
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: Pakistani intel told him Iran does have a new clear weapon.
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  Speaker 1: Oh jeez, and uh and.
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  Speaker 3: Phil Giraldi complaining quite properly about Section two twenty four
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  Speaker 3: of the National Defense Authorization Act, which would automatically give
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: Israeli officials access to American top secret information as a
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  Speaker 3: matter of law. Oh did you know that that is
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  Speaker 3: in the legislation?
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  Speaker 2: No, I did not, which is why I reacted exactly
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  Speaker 2: the way I did. I'm in a state of disbelief
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  Speaker 2: on that one. Judging and a Polaitano. We will listen
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  Speaker 2: to Judging Freedom today. Find the podcast where you get
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: your podcasts, and tune in every Wednesday at eight thirty
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  Speaker 2: Here on the fifty five Cars Morning Show and enjoy
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  Speaker 2: the analysis from Judging and Apolitano. Have a great week,
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: my friend. I won't be around next week. I'm getting
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: my cancer treatment Thursday Friday. The next week, I'm going
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: to be recovering from chemo. I got chemo brain and
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: I just two weeks from today, Sir, I'll look
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  Speaker 1: Forward to the best, best of luck to you.