September 11, 2001: A Forum of Information and News, Especially Related to Capital Punishment | Death Penalty Information Center

September 11, 2001: A Forum of Information and News, Especially Related to Capital Punishment

General News Articles

Earlier Proposal for Federal Trials

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder had announced that five men being held in Guantanamo prison in con­nec­tion with the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center will face tri­al in fed­er­al court in New York City: Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, Walid bin Attash, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi and Ramzi bin al-Shibh. These defen­dants could face the fed­er­al death penal­ty. (C. Savage, U.S. To Try Avowed 9/​11 Mastermind Before Civilian Court in New York,” New York Times, November 142009.)

However, in 2011, Holder announced that these detainees would be tried before mil­i­tary com­mis­sions in Guantanamo, rather than under the fed­er­al death penalty.

Five oth­er detainees held in con­nec­tion with oth­er acts of ter­ror­ism will face tri­als before mil­i­tary com­mis­sions: Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, Ahmed Mohammed Ahmed Haza al-Darbi, Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al-Qosi, Oma Ahmed Khadr, and Noor Uthman Muhammed.

See also:

Defense Lawyers in 9/​11 Case Face Huge Hurdles” by Daphne Eviatar, Huffington Post, August 212013

Empty Chairs” by Daphne Eviatar, The American Lawyer, April 1, 2008 (dif­fi­cul­ty in find­ing qual­i­fied coun­sel and oth­er due process prob­lems in Military Commission cap­i­tal tri­als) (sub­scrip­tion required to view)

Is The Bush Administration Right to Seek the Death Penalty for 9/​11 Captives?” by Michael Dorf for FindLaw’s Write on February 132008

US Plans Death Camp” — This arti­cle reveals that the U.S. has pos­si­ble plans to turn Guantanamo Bay into a death camp, with its own death row and exe­cu­tion cham­ber. (Courier-Mail, May 262003).

Rules for Military Tribunals” a chart com­par­ing the some of the rules for mil­i­tary tri­bunals for ter­ror­ism sus­pects with courts-mar­tial and civilian courts.

Administration May Be Willing to Forgo Death Penalty in Extradition Cases — U.S offi­cials have indi­cat­ed that, in order to gain cus­tody of sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ists in Europe, they maybe will­ing to make con­ces­sions on both the death penal­ty and the use of mil­i­tary tri­bunals. Currently, England, Italy, and Spain hold sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ists, but are among the over 40 nations that have signed the European Convention on Human Rights, which con­demns the use of the death penal­ty and pos­si­bly the use of mil­i­tary tri­bunals. Spain has already said that it will not extra­dite the eight sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ists in its cus­tody with­out assur­ances that the death penal­ty will not be sought (see below). In the past, the U.S. has giv­en such guar­an­tees as a con­di­tion of extra­di­tion. (Associated Press, 12/​1/​01). See also, inter­na­tion­al death penal­ty.

No return to exe­cu­tion — The US death penal­ty as a bar­ri­er to extra­di­tion” — This new report by Amnesty International exam­ines the prac­tice of for­eign gov­ern­ments which refuse to extra­dite sus­pects to the U.S. with­out first obtain­ing assur­ances that the death penal­ty will not be sought or imposed. (Amnesty International, AMR 51/​171/​2001)

Federal Legislation Related to the Attack of September 11, 2001 — View Congress’s Web site fea­tur­ing Bills & Joint Resolutions signed into law, approved res­o­lu­tions, leg­is­la­tion with floor action, and leg­is­la­tion with­out floor action.

On November 13th, President Bush signed a mil­i­tary order autho­riz­ing the Secretary of Defense to detain and pros­e­cute, by mil­i­tary com­mis­sions, non‑U.S. cit­i­zens who are or were mem­bers of al Qaeda and who have engaged in, aid­ed or abet­ted, or con­spired to com­mit acts of inter­na­tion­al ter­ror­ism. These mil­i­tary com­mis­sions would be empow­ered to ren­der sen­tences extend­ing to life impris­on­ment or death upon con­vic­tion. Read the MILITARY ORDER: Detention, Treatment, and Trial of Certain Non-cit­i­zens in the War Against Terrorism” (11/​13/​01)

The Terrorist Bombings Convention Implementation Act of 2001 — Title I of the Act autho­rizes the impo­si­tion of the death penal­ty for the offens­es set forth in Section 102 of the bill. While the pro­posed leg­is­la­tion was in the House Judiciary Committee, Congressman William D. Delahunt of Massachusetts offered an amend­ment to delete the lan­guage pro­vid­ing for the death penal­ty. The amend­ment, how­ev­er, was not incor­po­rat­ed.
 

Zacarias Moussaoui Case

Read Terrorism Trial’s Strategies Revealed, Washington Post, Nov. 14, 2005, regard­ing the penal­ty phase of Moussaoui’s capital trial.

Read the United States’ Notice of Intent ot Seek a Sentence of Death” for sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ist Zacarias Moussaoui, filed in the U.S. District court for the Eastern District of Virginia in March 2002. Read the 6 count indict­ment against Moussaoui, filed in in December 2001.

Federal Jury Gives Moussaoui Life in Prison Without Parole — A fed­er­al jury vot­ed today that Zacarias Moussaoui should serve a sen­tence of life in prison with­out parole despite the gov­ern­men­t’s asser­tion that his lies to FBI offi­cials con­tributed to the ter­ror­ist attacks of September 11, 2001. Earlier the jury had found that Moussaoui was respon­si­ble for some of the deaths that took place on September 11, and that he was eli­gi­ble for the death penal­ty. After weeks of tes­ti­mo­ny dur­ing the sen­tenc­ing phase of the tri­al, the jury took 7 days to rec­om­mend a sen­tence of life with­out parole. In their ver­dict, the jury unan­i­mous­ly agreed that Moussaoui know­ing­ly cre­at­ed a grave risk of death” for more than the intend­ed vic­tims of September 11th, and that he com­mit­ted his acts with sub­stan­tial plan­ning,” two of the aggra­vat­ing fac­tors list­ed in the death penalty statute.

Moussaoui’s defense team, with whom he did not coop­er­ate, argued that he is a delu­sion­al schiz­o­phrenic. They main­tained that Moussaoui took the wit­ness stand to con­fess his role in the September 11 attacks because he want­ed to achieve mar­tyr­dom through exe­cu­tion. During the sen­tenc­ing phase, jurors heard tes­ti­mo­ny from vic­tims’ fam­i­ly mem­bers, some of whom sup­port­ed and some who opposed the death penal­ty for Moussaoui, from men­tal health experts, and oth­ers who were direct­ly impact­ed by the events of 9/​11.

Following the ver­dict, Terry Rockefeller, whose sis­ter was killed in the World Trade Center attacks, not­ed, Had the jury sen­tenced Zacarias Moussaoui to death we would have turned a man with long-term men­tal health prob­lems, whose direct respon­si­bil­i­ty for the 9/​11 attacks are ten­u­ous, into a mar­tyr. Evidence intro­duced dur­ing the tri­al cast sig­nif­i­cant doubt on Moussaoui’s impor­tance with­in al Qaeda.… [M]ost fun­da­men­tal­ly, I oppose the death penal­ty because I do not want to be the cit­i­zen of a state that kills. I do not want to be a par­ty to more vio­lence and killing.“

The attacks took the lives of near­ly 3,000 peo­ple and were the dead­liest ter­ror­ist attack in U.S. his­to­ry. The Alexandria cour­t­house where the tri­al was held is just miles away from the Pentagon, where one of the 9/​11 attacks occured. Federal judge Leonie Brinkema is expect­ed to impose the life sen­tence on Thursday, May 4. (CNN & Associated Press, May 3, 2006, and Statement issued by Terry Rockefeller, May 3, 2006). Read the Jury’s Verdict Form. See Federal Death Penalty and Arbitrariness.

  • NEW VOICES: Senior Counsel to 9/​11 Commission Questions Death Penalty for Moussaoui — In a recent New York Times op-ed, John Farmer, senior coun­sel to the 9/​11 com­mis­sion and a for­mer New Jersery attor­ney gen­er­al, states that seek­ing the death penal­ty for Zacarias Moussaoui detracts from U.S. efforts to seek jus­tice against senior Al Qaeda offi­cials who plot­ted and car­ried out the 9/​11 attacks. Farmer claims Moussauoi, who was in jail as ter­ror­ists plot­ted and car­ried out the events of 9/​11, was not the 20th hijack­er” and is a poor stand in” for more senior lev­el Al Qaeda lead­ers who are also in U.S. custody:

Through a per­verse con­flu­ence, Mr. Moussaoui’s inter­est in becom­ing some­thing in death that he nev­er was in life — impor­tant — has com­bined with the gov­ern­men­t’s inter­est in exe­cut­ing some­one for the 9/​11 attacks. The like­ly result is an odd form of assist­ed sui­cide, in which Mr. Moussaoui will claim mar­tyr­dom as he is exe­cut­ed, and the United States will claim that the rule of law has been vin­di­cat­ed by bring­ing a ter­ror­ist to jus­tice for 9/​11.

Neither claim will be jus­ti­fied.…

Zacarias Moussaoui is evil, and there is no doubt that he arrived here deter­mined to kill Americans, but he was not a leader of Al Qaeda. He was not even, as ini­tial­ly report­ed, the 20th hijack­er.” He was not in con­tact with the 9/​11 hijack­ers in the United States. His appre­hen­sion in late August 2001 did noth­ing to dis­rupt the plot’s tim­ing. He sat in jail while the attacks unfold­ed.

Based on his con­duct, he should sit in jail some more. Six floors under­ground, with one hour out­side his cell per week. For, oh, 50 more years or so. He should die there, frus­trat­ed and for­got­ten, embit­tered and anony­mous. This could have been achieved with­out the cathar­sis of the penal­ty hear­ing. (New York Times, April 11, 2006). See Federal Death Penalty.

NEW VOICES: Mother of September 11 Victim Opposes Death Penalty for Moussaoui — Alice Hoagland’s son, Mark Bingham (pic­tured), was killed on September 11 as he joined with fel­low United Airlines pas­sen­gers to ground a plane that may have been head­ed toward the White House. Hoagland is urg­ing a life sen­tence for Zacarias Moussaoui, who faces the death penal­ty for his role in the ter­ror­ist events of that day. In an inter­view with The Advocate, Hoagland not­ed that spar­ing Moussaoui’s life would hon­or a rev­er­ence for all life” and that it would pre­vent some from view­ing him as a mar­tyr. Hoagland, a for­mer flight atten­dant who is now active in trans­porta­tion safe­ty issues, stated:

We Americans have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to keep him from becom­ing glo­ri­fied as a mar­tyr.… Al Qaida, oth­er fun­da­men­tal­ist Muslim groups — even main­stream Muslims — would be tempt­ed to view Moussaoui’s death as a mar­tyr­dom. This man does not deserve that hon­or.

We Americans have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to demon­strate our com­pas­sion toward a man who has shown no com­pas­sion for America. We are a nation of laws, of jus­tice, and of mer­cy. By spar­ing his life, we can demon­strate our human­i­ty by acknowl­edg­ing the human­i­ty of a human being who bad­ly needs com­pas­sion. By spar­ing his life, we will have over­come the sort of hatred that he dis­plays toward us.

It is dif­fi­cult to imag­ine a more despi­ca­ble human than Zacarias Moussaoui has shown him­self to be. But he, like all of us, is a bun­dle of traits and atti­tudes. His low­er self has dic­tat­ed his present low behav­ior. I hope we as a nation can demon­strate our high­er impuls­es by spar­ing his life — while keep­ing him safe­ly behind bars for the remain­der of his life. If we can do that, we will hon­or our own high stan­dard of rev­er­ence for all life, and we will mod­el a bet­ter stan­dard of behav­ior for Zacarias Moussaoui to take to heart. (Advocate​.com, April 8, 2006. Hoagland’s com­ments will appear in the May 9, 2006, edi­tion of The Advocate (Calif.)).
 

International News

  • Germany Hesitates to Supply Evidence that Would Aid in Prosecution of Moussaoui — German author­i­ties are reluc­tant to turn over evi­dence in their pos­ses­sion that could demon­strate a rela­tion­ship between sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ist Zacarious Moussaoui and the per­pe­tra­tors of the September 11th attacks on the U.S. Moussaoui is charged with 6 counts of con­spir­a­cy in con­nec­tion to the attacks and faces the death penal­ty if con­vict­ed. German offi­cials, who do not want to con­tribute to the case as long as it could poten­tial­ly result in the exe­cu­tion of Moussaoui, are cur­rent­ly nego­ti­at­ing with American offi­cials in an attempt to find a sat­is­fac­to­ry com­pro­mise. (Washington Post, 6/​11/​02)
  • British Authorities Oppose Capital Punishment for Detainees — Chris Patten, the European Commissioner for External Affairs, said that it was incon­ceiv­able that the three British cit­i­zens being held at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay could be sub­ject to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment after being tried in a mil­i­tary tri­bunal. I just think that would be a way of los­ing inter­na­tion­al sup­port and los­ing the moral high ground that the inter­na­tion­al coali­tion has,” said Patten.
    Foreign Office Minister Ben Bradshaw added: The British Government reg­u­lar­ly, in cas­es where the death penal­ty may be imposed on British cit­i­zens, makes our views on the death penal­ty very plain to the American author­i­ties. We are opposed to the death penal­ty.” (BBC News, 1/​22/​02)
  • Ashcroft says death penal­ty extra­di­tion issue to be han­dled case-by-case” (Associated Press, 12/​12/​01) — Reports that U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft feels it is best to con­sid­er extra­di­tion cases individually.
  • Spain Will Refuse to Extradite Terrorists If U.S. Seeks Death Penalty — A Spanish Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Spain will not extra­dite ter­ror­ist sus­pects to the U.S. with­out assur­ances that they will not be sub­ject to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The spokesman cit­ed European Union agree­ments that pre­vent mem­bers from extra­dit­ing sus­pects to coun­tries where judi­cial norms are seen as falling below those in the Union. (Associated Press, 11/​23/​01)
  • U.S. Death Penalty Could Prove Hurdle to Extradition of Terror Suspects from Britain” (Associated Press, 10/​8/​01) Reports that European human rights leg­is­la­tion may hin­der Britain from extra­dit­ing sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ists to the U.S, if they would be sub­ject to the death penalty.
  • U.S. Differences with Europe on Death Penalty Could Impede Progress on Terrorism — The U.S. may have to agree that it will not pur­sue the death penal­ty against sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ists in order to have them extra­dit­ed from Europe. In the next few weeks, European Union lead­ers will meet with U.S. offi­cials to decide on extra­di­tion pro­ce­dures for those sus­pect­ed of the U.S. ter­ror­ist attacks on September 11. In the past, European coun­tries, which oppose cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, have refused to extra­dite crim­i­nals to the U.S. unless U.S. offi­cials stip­u­late that the death penal­ty will not be sought. Several European Union min­is­ters have asked for a new com­pre­hen­sive agree­ment that would address the issue of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. (USA Today, 10/​3/​01) See also, International Death Penalty.

Principal Treaties

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
The U.S. rat­i­fied the treaty.

Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
The U.S. rat­i­fied the treaty in 1994.

International Convention on the Rights of the Child
The U.S. has signed but not rat­i­fied this document.

Vienna Convention on Consular Relations
The U.S. rat­i­fied the Vienna Convention in 1969.

Law Review Articles

Ostrom, Brian J., et at. The Prosecution and Punishment of Intentional Terrorists in Federal Courts: 1980 – 19983 Criminology and Public Policy 311 (2002).

Donohue, Laura K.,“Bias, National Security and Military Tribunals” (reac­tion essay) 3 Criminology and Public Policy 339 (2002).

Turk, Austin T., Confronting Enemies Foreign and Domestic: An American Dilemma?” (reac­tion essay) 3 Criminology and Public Policy 345 (2002).

Symposium, Capital Punishment in the Age of Terrorism” 41 The Catholic Lawyer 187 (2001). The text from a sym­po­sium spon­sored by the Association of the Bar of the City of New York fea­tures lead­ing death penal­ty experts close­ly exam­in­ing how gov­ern­ments respond to nation­al crimes, such as the ter­ror­ist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, that trig­ger fac­tors that are not present in ordi­nary first-degree murder cases.