Buhsists ask District Court to dismiss Guantanamo cases, claiming detainee legal status is "settled"

[BurtWorm]

The arrogance never ceases...

http://www.scotusblog.com/movabletype/archives/2007/04/government_move_2.html

Thursday, April 19, 2007
Government moves to end detainee cases

Posted by Lyle Denniston at 03:51 PM

UPDATE 8:00 p.m.
Lawyers for Guantanamo detainees notified the District Court that they would formally oppose the government's motion to dismiss all of the detainee cases, saying they will argue that the District judges do not have the authority to act on the dismissal request while the D.C. Circuit Court retains its mandate in the underlying cases. Among papers attached to the "notice of filing" were copies of motions they have filed in the Circuit Court, along with a copy of an "emergency application" that the attorneys said they would file in the Supreme Court if rebuffed by the Circuit Court. They noted that this final document had been "lodged" at the Court, not formally filed. The packet of materials can be viewed with Pacer on the District Court docket for 04-1254 (Abdah v. Bush).

* * * * *
With perhaps scores of cases involving Guantanamo Bay detainees lingering on the threshold of the Supreme Court, the Justice Department on Thursday formally asked District Court judges in Washington, D.C., to dismiss up to 185 pending cases challenging continued confinement at the U.S. military prison at a base in Cuba. The Department argued that the judges must act without waiting for the D.C. Circuit to put into effect formally its Feb. 20 ruling that no court may consider any habeas challenge by any foreign national captured in the "war on terrorism." The motion, in the same form in all 185 cases, can be found here. (The text supplied here does not include attached exhibits.)

The filing reopened a new legal skirmish in the District Courts, thus drawing them back into the middle of the ongoing courthouse fray over detainees' legal status -- a fray that is rapidly unfolding in the D.C. Circuit, and may imminently return to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court on April 2 refused to review the Circuit Court's Feb. 20 decision, and that presumably allowed the Circuit Court to issue the mandate in those cases and thus put the ruling into effect. Detainees' lawyers, however, have asked the Circuit Court to postpone that action, so that they can continue to pursue other legal remedies -- including a possible return trip to the Supreme Court. The Circuit Court has not reacted to that plea.

In the Justice Department's dismissal motions Thursday, it said that, in light of the Feb. 20 ruling, "the law of this Circuit is settled." In a footnote, it cited a D.C. Circuit Court concurring opinion in 1990 saying that "once an opinion is released it becomes the law of this circuit" and a 1987 opinion of that Court saying that panels are bound by the "law of the circuit." That footnote also said that the D.C. Circuit had itself dismissed other Guantanamo-related cases since Feb. 20.

[mmonk]

1. "Settled" even though "enemy combatant" has no definition.

This shiit drives me crazy.

[BurtWorm]

2. Me too.

The most unwise of all being in charge of justice--that's enough to drive anyone crazy.