Judge voids scores of captives' habeas cases

[Bluebear]

WASHINGTON -- A federal judge has dismissed more than 100 habeas corpus lawsuits filed by former Guantánamo captives, ruling that because the Bush and Obama administrations had transferred them elsewhere, the courts need not decide whether the Pentagon imprisoned them illegally.

The ruling dismayed attorneys for some of the detainees who had hoped any favorable U.S. court findings would help clear their clients of the stigma, travel restrictions and, in some instances, perhaps more jail time that resulted from their stay at Guantánamo.

U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan wrote he was "not unsympathetic" to the former detainees' plight. "Detention for any length of time can be injurious. And certainly associations with Guantánamo tend to be negative," he wrote.

But the detainees' release from the remote base in southeast Cuba made their cases moot. "The court finds that petitioners no longer present a live case or controversy since a federal court cannot remedy the alleged collateral consequences of their prior detention at Guantánamo," he wrote.



Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/04/05/1564840/judge-voids-scores-of-guantanamo.html#ixzz0kHzVCwFc