Padilla case is light on details

http://www.miamiherald.com/884/story/98499.html

WAR ON TERROR

Padilla case is light on details

Jurors in terrorism suspect Jose Padilla's trial won't hear the most serious allegations against him because prosecutors don't want to expose the Bush administration's tactics in the war on terrorism.

BY JAY WEAVER
jweaver@MiamiHerald.com

A dozen Miami-Dade County jurors to be selected Tuesday for the Jose Padilla terrorism trial will soon hear about a U.S.-based mission to carry out ''violent jihad'' overseas, including evidence of his al Qaeda application.

What jurors won't hear are the damning details of Padilla's suspected plots with al Qaeda operatives to plant radiological ''dirty bombs'' and to blow up apartment buildings in major U.S. cities.

That evidence -- along with incriminating testimony from al Qaeda members detained at the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba -- won't be introduced at the federal trial that gets under way with opening statements on May 14.

Even Padilla's alleged key meeting with a top al Qaeda commander is not part of the indictment brought against him by the federal government. snip

That's largely because Padilla's statements to authorities in the brig -- as well as U.S. military, FBI and CIA interrogations of al Qaeda operatives who fingered him -- won't be presented at trial.

Prosecutors didn't venture to bring such evidence against Padilla because it would have opened the door for defense attorneys to explore the credibility of witnesses, possible torture tactics and national security secrets.

They never thought anybody was gonna question their methods, so how can we expect them to have done things so as to satisfy nitpicky little critics who don't like torture, subornation of perjury and suspension of habeas corpus?

Just a funny feeling.

Don

That should send a message to terrorists everywhere. Or at least to the U.S. citizenry, if we're sharp enough to hear it.