April 23, 2013 at 2:55 P.M. Theft of a bank account's PIN number is unwise given today's law enforcement techniques. Telephone calls continue to be made to my home at all hours from unusual numbers: April 16, 2013 at 2:27 P.M. from 347-502-2576; April 15, 2013 at 7:27 P.M. and April 13, 2013 at 11:22 A.M. from 323-446-0630, "Collection Tech," even though I do not have any matters in "collection." Perhaps "Collection Tech" is also "CCA EOS"?
Please direct any threats or attacks against me and not my family members.
"How to Handle a Terrorism Case: Despite Republican catcalls, the civilian legal system can best prosecute the accused bomber," (Editorial) in The New York Times, April 22, 2013, at p. A20.
"Broken Justice in the Bronx: Unconscionable delays in the borough's criminal courts require immediate action," (Editorial) in The New York Times, April 22, 2013, at p. A20.
Paul Solotaroff, "A Most American Way to Die," in Rolling Stone, April 25, 2013, at p. 58. http://www.rollingstone.com ("If you're a black teen in Florida cranking hip-hop, a heavily armed and enraged Tea Partier can gun you down in broad daylight -- and he may just get away with it." Is this an ethical legal system, Mr. Rubio?)
Patrick Doyle, "Last Days of an Iraq War Hero: After Years of Pain, Thomas Young Plans to End His Suffering," in Rolling Stone, April 25, 2013, at p. 22. (Will the government's mistreatment of this Iraq war hero be justified by classifying Mr. Young as an "enemy combatant"?)
Charlie Savage, "G.O.P. Lawmakers Push to Have Boston Suspect Questioned as Enemy Combatant," in The New York Times, April 22, 2013, at p. A8.
The absurd focus on trivial and ephemeral matters with regard to legal ethics, such as occasional tardiness by prosecutors and defense counsel -- or even judges -- as opposed to systemic delays that violate rights, is a way of avoiding the urgent ethical crisis surrounding complicity by lawyers in what can only be described as evil. ("Law and Ethics in the Soprano State" and "New Jersey's Unethical Judiciary.")
By evil, I mean, torture and assassination outside the boundaries of law, corruption and bought and paid-for biases in a legal system. ("Legal Ethics Today" and "America's Torture Lawyers.")
Dzhorkhar Tzarnaev's dramatic arrest resulting in his current critical condition has renewed an intense debate over the resolution of competing values in dealing with accused terrorists apprehended in the United States of America -- terrorists whose alleged criminal actions take place within the nation's borders and who are properly regarded as "subjects of the law."
Can we reconcile the requirements of legality and adherence to moral principles with the need for security in a free and democratic society? The answer to this question is that we must do so. We must be safe and we will also remain free because this is America. ("John Rawls and Justice" and "Charles Fried and Legal Interpretation.")
American lawyers and judges must not behave like terrorists. Due process and equal protection of the laws cannot be sacrificed to an illusory security because these jurisprudential values and a few other political principles are America's security from dictatorship. ("Manifesto For the Unfinished American Revolution.")
However horrifying their criminal actions, it seems clear -- based on a thousand-year history of our laws and institutions -- that accused terrorists are entitled to respect for their human rights and even to receive from society what terrorists often deny to their victims: concern for human dignity at every stage in the proceedings against them.
No one has yet been proven guilty of any criminal action in a court of law. Assuming that Mr. Tsarnaev is guilty of these terrible crimes, he must be punished in accordance with the law and in a humane fashion. Judges must never be swayed to deviate from providing exactly such punishment as the law allows with due solemnity, rationality, proportionality and decorum as required by America's Constitution.
If America's legal system -- like every legal system in the world -- affords the worst criminals, such as Jeffrey Dahmer, due process of law, then what legally plausible reason exists for denying such protections to an accused terrorist bomber? None. We do this for any human being, however hateful that person may be, not for that person's sake alone (or primarily), but for the sake of our civilization. ("America's Legal Ethics Today" and "Is America's Legal Ethics a Lie?")
In responding to calls from some Republicans for classifying Mr. Tsarnaev as an "enemy combatant," it may be wise to sharpen and clarify the issue and ensuing debate (or discussion) by asking whether, or to what extent, the "enemy," in the case of this defendant, is singular or plural.
Regardless of what contacts or connections may be found or proven to exist between this defendant and Al Qaeda, are there also "connections" to hostile foreign powers or governments and/or intelligence agencies not yet mentioned in the media? I suspect that such connections exist.
Dialogue and meaningful interrogation, developed from a position of mutual trust -- even with this accused person -- will always be more successful, in terms of yielding information, than the tortures at Guantanamo.
Street-level speculation has touched on the interests and actions of Russian intelligence; Israeli Mossad agents seeking to turn U.S. public opinion against Islamic terror organizations; together with several more bizarre scenarios -- none of which I find persuasive. Many people are still under the false impression that the Boston bombers are Jewish extremists.
Unspecified in this debate are the legal criteria for holding a defendant as an enemy combatant. If these undefined criteria, objective or subjective, for finding an American citizen to be an enemy combatant are satisfied, then the issue becomes: What can be done to enemy combatants? Torture? Murder? Secret detention without trial, indefinite detention, drugging, hypnosis, denial of medical treatment for suffering persons -- all of these "tactics" have been recommended, quite seriously, by persons unaware of echoing the thoughts of Adolf Eichman and other luminaries of the Third Reich.
Most of these hateful methods have been used in America's so-called "concentration camps." America's post-9/11 phase has made us a far different nation, more frightened (despite our immense power) and merciless as well as cruel than ever before in our history.
I continue to argue, along with many others, that such "get tough" tactics and our collective journey to Mr. Cheney's "Dark Side" have made us less secure and may be creating terrorism and terrorists acting against innocent civilians in this country who have been and will be injured or killed even as their counterparts are killed by U.S. drones, every day, in Pakistan, Yemen, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican from South Carolina, comments:
"You can't hold every person who commits a terrorist attack as an enemy combatant, I agree with that ... but you have a right, with his radical Islamist ties and the fact that Chechens are all over the world fighting with Al Qaeda -- I think you have a reasonable belief to go down that road, and it would be a big mistake not to go down that road. If we didn't hold him for intelligence gathering purposes, that would be unconscionable."
Holding him for "intelligence gathering purposes" is compatible with respect for the man's legal rights. Senator Graham's goal, arguably, seems to be to torture the suspect without a defense lawyer making annoying requests for humane conditions of confinement, bail, examination of the evidence against the accused, or instructing his client to remain silent. (Incidentally, I doubt that this wounded young man will have much to tell us, anyway, since he is probably a patsy.)
Failure to recognize what we claim to believe in, for which so many men and women have paid the ultimate price -- the same rights that we ask others in the world to observe with regard to their own citizens and any captured Americans -- makes us hypocrites and liars to the world. This we must NEVER be.
The primary reason to recognize Dzhorkhar Tsarnaev's human rights is that he is a person, a human being. Contradictions between our words and deeds deprive American public officials of credibility when they make speeches -- as Secretary of State John Kerry did recently -- anouncing our devotion and "commitment" to freedom of speech and dissidents' rights. Mr. Kerry did not limit this professed commitment to the rights of dissidents in other countries. ("How censorship works in America" and "What is it like to be plagiarized?")
Many lives depend upon America's moral authority which has been severely strained by Bush/Cheney policies that weaken our public officials' power to bring about humanitarian objectives and do great good in the world.
The global community NEEDS an inspiring moral example from the most powerful countries, primarily from America, but also from China and Russia as well as other nations in our increasingly multipolar world. Nations like the United Kingdom or Germany, France and, increasingly, Latin American countries -- like Brazil, Argentina, Chile -- must do more for peace internationally.
"Mr. Tsarnaev is a naturalized American citizen, an inconvenient fact for the 'pressure-him-at-Gitmo' crowd. He cannot be tried in a military commission, a legal system reserved for aliens. Even to be held by the military without trial would require a showing that he is associated with a declared enemy of the United States, such as Al Qaeda or the Taliban. So far there isn't any visible connection between the Tsarnaev brothers and anyone more malevolent. Their Islamic or Chechen heritage alone is hardly proof of jihadist intent."
