Najibullah Zazi: Another Counterterrorism Victory for Civilian Law

/in /by

The AP is reporting that Najibullah Zazi, who was arrested last September as he was preparing to deploy bombs made out of beauty supply derived TATP, will plead guilty later today.

Which means that less than a year after a person allegedly trained in Pakistani al Qaeda-affiliated training camps tried to attack in the US, he will start serving time for his crimes.

Meanwhile, a bunch of other Afghan and Pakistani-trained alleged terrorists rot away in Gitmo because Lindsey Graham has a fetish for military commissions.

As Jeralyn notes,

So he had lawyers from day 1, waived his Miranda rights, wasn’t tortured, and is now cooperating and pleading guilty. He’s going to get a reduced sentence in exchange for his cooperation. The U.S. gets the benefit of his knowledge. He gets punished and incarcerated.

All of this in a federal criminal court with him being provided his full panoply of constitutional rights.

This is the same scenario tha will play out with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. The same can and should be done with the 9/11 defendants.

Can we stop playing this counter-productive charade with military commissions now?

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  1. scribe says:

    We need not be in this charade, but it’s entirely too much fun for the thugs – Republican and Democrat – who work in and around our government for it to stop now.

  2. MaryCh says:

    Well, to coin a phrase: Sadly, no.

    The combined partisan imperative — not to acknowledge or support a successful policy/initiative of the current D administration, even if it reflects successful elements of a p/i of the immediate past R administration — and momentum/inertia generated by a longstanding R political strategy success — fearmongering to reap the benefits of 9/11, as a variation of the fundamental ‘when voters are afraid we win’ — dictate what the magic eight ball tells us.

        • Hmmm says:

          OT: You’ll never know for sure. So just keep a Post-It™ over the camera. Most tech folks I know do that most of the time. If that’s too ad-hoc for you, then there are products that stick there with adhesive and have a little, operable door.

  4. earlofhuntingdon says:

    Is this all you have to show for a weekend’s work? Hell, Dana Milbank could match this output in, oh, two or three months.