Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, will be required to release portions of his 2007 confession, which government prosecutors say was obtained through torture, if his case ends in a conviction. He agreed to use it in future sentencing trials. Life sentence.
Defense attorneys have long sought to have these confessions excluded from the death penalty trial of Mr. Mohammed and three other men accused of plotting the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. His lawyers had argued that he was given conditions to answer questions from his captors. He was subjected to waterboarding, beatings, and rectal abuse in the CIA's secret prison network.
But if Muhammad is allowed to plead guilty, prosecutors agree to use some of his confessions at issue at his sentencing, according to excerpts of his plea agreement released by a federal court over the weekend. did.
The deal is at the center of intense political and legal controversy that has spilled over into the Trump administration.
On July 31, after more than a decade of litigation, senior Pentagon appointees agreed to settle the capital suit against Mohammed and Walid bin Atash in exchange for waiving the right to conviction and appeal. , signed a separate agreement with Mustafa Al Hawsawi. Object to specific evidence. These transactions were submitted under seal to a military judge.
Two days later, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III moved to withdraw from the agreement. He said he wants to retroactively strip the authority he appointed, former Army attorney Susan K. Escarier, to reach an agreement and bring the men to justice.
Currently, a federal court has halted the filing of the petition while it determines whether Mr. Austin had the authority to breach the contract and whether to send the case back to a full trial.
The court's release of excerpts from the plea agreement comes at a critical time.
Hearings in the case of Ammar al-Baluch, the fourth defendant in the case, are still ongoing at Guantanamo Bay. Military judge Col. Matthew N. McCall will decide whether to exclude Mr. Baluch from the death penalty trial because his confession was obtained under torture.
Mr. Baluch's case proceeded without the participation of attorneys for the three men, who had sought to plead guilty to avoid an eventual death penalty trial.
There is precedent for military commissions suppressing confessions. In August 2023, an Army judge threw out similar evidence in another major Guantanamo case against a prisoner accused of plotting to blow up the USS Cole in 2000. Prosecutors are seeking to reinstate the FBI's 2007 interrogation.
In Washington, the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals has scheduled arguments for January 28 on whether plea deals for three other defendants can proceed. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Mr. Austin by Justice Department appointees from the Biden administration, who are resigning on Monday.
Career Justice Department lawyers have now taken over the case and submitted excerpts, in agreement with Mr. Mohammed, Mr. bin Attash and Mr. Kawsawi's military commission lawyers. Court filings also revealed that Bin Attash and Hawsawi also agreed to have some of their 2007 confessions used against them at sentencing if their pleas go forward. .
But the Trump administration has not said how it will handle the plea deal. The judge, Colonel McCall, said if the circuit court resolves the case in favor of the petition, the case could be heard in February. If the deal falls through, defense attorneys will likely go back to trying to keep the confessions out of court.
Like his co-defendants, Baluch was arrested in Pakistan in 2003, spent more than three years in CIA custody, and was transferred to Guantanamo Bay in September 2006. Within months of the transfer, FBI agents were brought in to question the men. For evidence used in court.
His lawyers argued during those early months that there was no reason to believe he could provide his interrogators with any answers beyond those he had provided to the CIA for years.
Lawyers for all four men also asked the judge to throw out records from their appearances before a panel of military officers called the Combatant Status Review Tribunal in early 2007. They claim that they too are tainted by torture.
In Mr. Mohammed's courtroom on March 10, 2007, an unidentified U.S. military officer read a statement that Mr. Mohammed said was “I was responsible for the 9/11 operation from start to finish.''
According to excerpts from the plea agreement, Mr. Muhammad also agreed to have some of the records used against him at sentencing.
Clayton G. Tribbett Jr., the lead prosecutor who negotiated the plea deal, described plans for a sentencing trial, saying it would begin later this year and possibly extend into 2026.
He said the sentencing will include months of presentations to the commission and the public “to establish a historical record of the defendant's involvement in what happened on September 11th,” as well as interviews with victims and survivors. It said it could also include hundreds of victim impact statements by victims and relatives. those who were killed.
