[CitizensTruth] ARTICLE-Bush Six to be Indicted

[Walterb306 at cs.com]

All,

FYI.  Slow wheels of (real) justice cranking out.

Beverley

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-04-13/the-bush-six-to-be
-indicted/
THE DAILY BEAST

Blogs and Stories
by Scot Horton

The Bush Six to be Indicted
Spanish prosecutors will seek criminal charges against Alberto Gonzales and 
five high-ranking Bush administration officials for sanctioning torture at 
Guantánamo.
Spanish prosecutors have decided to press forward with a criminal 
investigation targeting former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five top 
associates over their role in the torture of five Spanish citizens held at 
Guantánamo, several reliable sources close to the investigation have told The 
Daily Beast. Their decision is expected to be announced on Tuesday before the 
Spanish central criminal court, the Audencia Nacional, in Madrid. But the 
decision is likely to raise concerns with the human-rights community on other 
points: They will seek to have the case referred to a different judge.
Both Washington and Madrid appear determined not to allow the pending 
criminal investigation to get in the way of improved relations.
The six defendants-in addition to Gonzales, Federal Appeals Court Judge and 
former Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, University of California law 
professor and former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, former 
Defense Department general counsel and current Chevron lawyer William J. Haynes 
II, Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff David Addington, and former 
Undersecretary of Defense Douglas J. Feith-are accused of having given the 
green light to the torture and mistreatment of prisoners held in U.S. 
detention in "the war on terror." The case arises in the context of a pending 
proceeding before the court involving terrorism charges against five Spaniards 
formerly held at Guantánamo. A group of human-rights lawyers originally filed 
a criminal complaint asking the court to look at the possibility of charges 
against the six American lawyers. Baltasar Garzón Real, the investigating 
judge, accepted the complaint and referred it to Spanish prosecutors for a 
view as to whether they would accept the case and press it forward. "The 
evidence provided was more than sufficient to justify a more comprehensive 
investigation," one of the lawyers associated with the prosecution stated.
But prosecutors will also ask that Judge Garzón, an internationally known 
figure due to his management of the case against former Chilean dictator 
Augusto Pinochet and other high-profile cases, step aside. The case originally 
came to Garzón because he presided over efforts to bring terrorism charges 
against the five Spaniards previously held at Guantánamo. Spanish prosecutors 
consider it "awkward" for the same judge to have both the case against 
former U.S. officials based on the possible torture of the five Spaniards at 
Guantánamo and the case against those very same Spaniards. A source close to the 
prosecution also noted that there was concern about the reaction to the 
case in some parts of the U.S. media, where it had been viewed, incorrectly, as 
a sort of personal frolic of Judge Garzón. Instead, the prosecutors will 
ask Garzón to transfer the case to Judge Ismail Moreno, who is currently 
handling an investigation into kidnapping charges surrounding the CIA's use of 
facilities as a safe harbor in connection with the seizure of Khalid el-Masri, 
a German greengrocer who was seized and held at various CIA blacksites for 
about half a year as a result of mistaken identity. The decision on the 
transfer will be up to Judge Garzón in the first instance, and he is expected to 
make a quick ruling. If he denies the request, it may be appealed.
Judge Garzón's name grabs headlines in Spain today less because of his 
involvement in the Gonzales torture case than because of his supervision of the 
Gürtel affair, in which leading figures of the conservative Partido Popular 
in Madrid and Valencia are now under investigation or indictment on 
suspicions of corruptly awarding public-works contracts. Garzón is also the nation's 
leading counterterrorism judge, responsible for hundreds of investigations 
targeting Basque terrorist groups, as well as a major recent effort to 
identify and root out al Qaeda affiliates operating in the Spanish enclaves of 
North Africa.
Announcement of the prosecutor's decision was delayed until after the 
Easter holiday in order not to interfere with a series of meetings between 
President Barack Obama and Spanish Prime Minister José Zapatero. However, contrary 
to a claim contained in an editorial on April 8 in the Wall Street Journal, 
the Obama State Department has been in steady contact with the Spanish 
government about the case. Shortly after the case was filed on March 17, chief 
prosecutor Javier Zaragoza was invited to the U.S. embassy in Madrid to brief 
members of the embassy staff about the matter. A person in attendance at 
the meeting described the process as "correct and formal." The Spanish 
prosecutors briefed the American diplomats on the status of the case, how it arose, 
the nature of the allegations raised against the former U.S. government 
officials. The Americans "were basically there just to collect information," 
the source stated.The Spanish prosecutors advised the Americans that they 
would suspend their investigation if at any point the United States were to 
undertake an investigation of its own into these matters. They pressed to know 
whether any such investigation was pending. These inquiries met with no 
answer from the U.S. side.
Spanish officials are highly conscious of the political context of the case 
and have measured the Obama administration's low-key reaction attentively. 
Although Spain is a NATO ally that initially supported "the war on terror" 
under Bush with a commitment of troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan, 
relations with the Bush administration deteriorated after Zapatero became prime 
minister and acted quickly to withdraw the Spanish contingent in Iraq. In the 
2008 presidential campaign, Republican John McCain referred to Spain as a 
hostile state in comments that mystified Spaniards (it appears that McCain may 
have confused Spain with Venezuela and Zapatero with Hugo Chávez). Recently, 
the United States and Spain also wrangled over Spain's decision to withdraw 
its troop commitment in Kosovo as well. Both Zapatero and Obama, however, 
have given a high priority to improving relations between the two 
long-standing allies. Spanish newspapers hailed the fact that Obama referred to Zapatero 
three times as "my good friend" during the recent European summit meetings, 
a sharp contrast with meetings at which former President Bush gave Zapatero 
a cold shoulder.
Both Washington and Madrid appear determined not to allow the pending 
criminal investigation to get in the way of improved relations, which both 
desire, particularly in regard to coordinated economic policy to confront the 
current financial crisis and a reshaped NATO mandate for action in Afghanistan. 
With the case now proceeding, that will be more of a challenge. The reaction 
on American editorial pages is divided-some questioning sharply why the 
Obama administration is not conducting an investigation, which is implicitly 
the question raised by the Spanish prosecutors. Publications loyal to the Bush 
team argue that the Spanish investigation is an "intrusion" into American 
affairs, even when those affairs involve the torture of five Spaniards on 
Cuba.
The Bush Six labored at length to create a legal black hole in which they 
could implement their policies safe from the scrutiny of American courts and 
the American media. Perhaps they achieved much of their objective, but the 
law of unintended consequences has kicked in. If U.S. courts and prosecutors 
will not address the matter because of a lack of jurisdiction, foreign 
courts appear only too happy to step in.
Scott Horton is a law professor and writer on legal and national-security 
affairs for Harper's magazine and The American Lawyer, among other 
publications

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