Court Rules in Favor of Enemy Combatant

On December 12, 2001, AL-MARRI was arrested as a material witness in connection with the investigation of the September 11 Attacks. AL-MARRI was subsequently indicted by a grand jury sitting in this District for the unauthorized possession of 15 or more access devices — credit card numbers — with the intent to defraud, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1029(a)(3).

President denied authority to detain civilians in U.S.
The Justice Department said on Monday that it will ask the full 12-member Fourth Circuit Court to reconsider en banc the panel decision in Al-Marri v. Wright (Circuit docket 06-7427).
The Fourth Circuit Court, in a 2-1 ruling on Monday, declared that President Bush did not have the authority to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain a civilian who was taken from his home in Peoria, Ill. For the Qatar national who has been held by the military since 2003, the Court said, “military detention…must cease.” The ruling barred military detention of any civilian captured inside the U.S., but the Court said it was limiting its decision to those who are in the country legally and have established connections here.

“The President cannot eliminate constitutional protections with the stroke of a pen by proclaiming a civilian, even a criminal civilian, an enemy combatant subject to indefinite military detention,” the Court said.

The panel concluded that it would grant al-Marri habeas relief, though not immediate release. It said the government had accused him — though not with formal charges — of “grave crimes.” The case was returned to a federal judge in South Carolina with instructions to order the Pentagon to release al-Marri from military custody ….

“within a reasonable period of time to be set by the District Court. The Government can transfer al-Marri to civilian authorities to face criminal charges, initiate deportation proceedings against him, hold him as a material witness in connection with grand jury proceedings, or detain him for a limited time pursuant to the Patriot Act. But military detention of al-Marri must cease.”

Later, in 2003, he was declared an enemy combatant, and transferred to the U.S. Navy brig in Charleston, S.C., from which he challenged his detention. He lost in a U.S. District Court, in a decision overturned on appeal Monday.
The key part of the ruling on presidential powers declared:

“Even assuming the truth of the government’s allegations [against al-Marri], the President lacks the power to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain al-Marri….[W]e have found no authority for holding that the evidence offered by the Government affords a basis for treating al-Marri as an enemy combatant, or as anything other than a civilian….The President’s constitutional powers do not allow him to order the military to seize and detain indefinitely al-Marri without criminal process any more than they permit the President to order the military to seize and detain, without criminal process, other terrorists within the United States, like the Unabomber or the perpetrators of the Oklahoma City bombing.”

“In light of al-Marri’s due process rights under our Constitution and Congress’s express prohibition in the Patriot Act on the indefinite detention of those civilians arrested as ‘terrorist aliens’ within this country,” the majority said, “we can only conclude that in the case at hand, the President claims a power that far exceeds that granted him by the Constitution.”

In an opinion written by Circuit Judge Diana Gribbon Motz, the Court said:

“We do not question the President’s war-time authority over enemy combatants; but absent suspension of the writ of habeas corpus or declaration of martial law, the Constitution simply does not provide the President with the power to exercise military authority over civilians within the United States.”

Wild Thing’s comment……..
Think about thousands of Al Qaeda attacking in America and the precedent set by this court. The precedent is that our military guys would be breaking the law by taking up arms ahgainst Al Qaeda infiltrators. Somehow, I just can’t applaud that jurisprudence.
This decision is flatly, undeniably and ridiculously WRONG, not correct. An enemy combatant is one no matter where we find him or what his country of origin, even when he is found in the US and was born here. He can still be a member of the Iranian army or al-Quaida, and they are our enemy, and we can shoot them, detain them or whatever we want when we are at war with them. To think otherwise is to allow the enemy sanctuary INSIDE the US that we would not give them on the battlefield. They have it backwards.
The court’s ruling is limited to (a) civilians, who are (b) citizens or legal residents of the U.S., and (c) are seized within the 50 states.
If Bush has his way and gets the Amnesty bill resurrected passed, this will be a bonanza win for every al Qaeda operative who is presently here illegally. Overnight they will be declared legal residents entitled to the multi-million dollar pro defenses that every America-despising liberal law firm will be fighting to provide.
This decision isn’t an expression of our strength as a nation, but an expression of our abject weakness. We are dying as a nation. We are beset by parasites that hang dripping from the national jugular.