Citing poor evidence, judge orders release of 5 Guantanamo detainees

Ruling delivers new blow to the Bush policies; yet it's unclear whether freedom will come soon.

By NEWS SERVICES

Last update: November 20, 2008 - 9:14 PM

WASHINGTON - A federal judge for the first time Thursday ruled that the Bush administration had no basis for holding several long-term prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and he ordered the immediate release of five Algerian men.

The case was an important test of the Bush administration's detention policies, which critics have long argued swept up innocent men and low-level foot soldiers, along with hardened terrorists, and locked them up without charges.

Still, despite years of litigation, no prisoner at the U.S. naval base has been released as a result of a judge's order.

U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon said the government's evidence linking the five Algerians to Al-Qaida was not credible as it came from a single, unidentified source.

"To allow enemy combatancy to rest on so thin a reed would be inconsistent with this court's obligation," Leon told the crowded courtroom.

In an unusual entreaty, Leon also urged the administration not to appeal his order. "Seven years of waiting for our legal system to give them an answer to a question so important is, in my judgment, more than enough," Leon said.

Leon, however, backed the continued imprisonment of a sixth Algerian, concluding that the Justice Department had sufficient evidence he was a supporter of Al-Qaida.

The six men are among a group of Guantanamo inmates who won a 2006 Supreme Court ruling that the detainees have constitutional rights and can seek release in federal court. More than 200 other detainees await similar reviews in Washington's federal court.

'Justice comes too late'

J. Wells Dixon, a detainees' lawyer at the Center for Constitutional Rights, said the ruling made clear that Guantanamo Bay had failed. But, he said, "Justice comes too late for these five men."

"The decision by Judge Leon lays bare the scandalous basis on which Guantanamo has been based -- slim evidence of dubious quality," said Zachary Katznelson, legal director at Reprieve, a British legal group that represents many detainees.

Katznelson also noted that the ruling came from "a tough, no-nonsense judge."

Leon, who was appointed by President Bush, had been expected to be sympathetic to the government. In 2005 he issued the ruling that the detainees had no right to seek their freedom in court -- the case overturned by the Supreme Court.

The five men, natives of Algeria who immigrated to Bosnia more than a decade ago, are accused of plotting to travel to Afghanistan to fight the U.S. and its allies. The Bosnian courts and prosecutors had previously cleared the men, but on Jan. 17, 2002, Bosnia handed the men over to the U.S. government.

The Bosnian government already has agreed to take back the detainees.

More rulings to come

Last month, another district court judge in Washington, Ricardo M. Urbina, ordered the release of 17 other detainees, all ethnic Uighurs from western China. The judge did not hold a hearing on the evidence in that case because the government conceded that the men were not enemy combatants.

The Justice Department won a stay of Urbina's release order and is appealing. Arguments are scheduled for Monday in Washington.

President-elect Barack Obama has promised to close the Guantanamo Bay prison.

The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Associated Press and McClatchy News Service contributed to this report.

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