Major Constitutional Showdown (Scotus Blog)

Scotus Blog today: a major constitutional showdown, where the governent’s claim that they can make up sentences on the fly if they don’t like them

Escalating ParhatScotus Blog
Tuesday, August 19th, 2008 7:25 pm | Lyle Denniston

Reply Huzaifa Parhat to Goverment’s Opposition to Motions for Parole and Judgement Ordering Release
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/parhat-reply-dct-8-15-08.pdf

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.....Something else of deep constitutional significance is lurking in Parhat’s court case.

The Justice and Defense Departments are using the case to test anew their theory that the U.S. government has very broad constitutional authority — beyond the reach of the courts — to “wind up” (or “wind down”) the process of detention in a way that would mean that individual detainees, even though found not to be enemies (Parhat’s situation), would remain for extended periods at Guantanamo in a kind of legal limbo.

That status also could await any detainees — Hamdan could be the first example – who get convicted of war crimes, but then finish out their sentences and then seek release. (Pentagon officials already have signaled that they may hold Hamdan at Guantanamo when his sentence is completed early next year, and Hamdan’s lawyers have vowed to contest any such plan. Hamdan’s fate, though, may not be settled before Parhat’s case has first tested the “wind up” argument.)

In response to the government’s argument that the Executive Branch has the sole constitutional authority to “wind up Parhat’s detention in an orderly fashion” (meaning, among other things, no release into the U.S. and perhaps a prolonged stay at Guantanamo), Parhat’s lawyers have mounted a sweeping constitutional claim of their own. They are arguing (in a filing last Friday, found here) that the government theory amounts to an unconstitutional suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. That is the same argument that led the Supreme Court, in Boumediene v. Bush on June 12, to grant the detainees a constitutional right to challenge in civilian court their captivity.

more at:
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/analysis-escalating-the-parhat-case/

I hope that we can give them similar sentencing after their trials for war crimes....