| Fadi al Maqaleh |
|
Fadi al Maqaleh was 20 years old when he was first detained, but is now almost 27. During the entire 6-year period while he has been in U.S. custody, he has not been permitted to see his family, and has been denied any access to lawyers or a court of law. His family only learned that Mr. al Maqaleh was in U.S. custody after he had been imprisoned for many months, and their only contact with him since then has been through heavily redacted letters and a few brief telephone conversations. Because Mr. al Maqaleh is being held virtually incommunicado, his father authorized IJNetwork to file a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in U.S. court seeking Mr. al Maqaleh’s release. Though his case has now been pending for over three years, the government continues to refuse to allow Mr. al Maqaleh, or any other Bagram detainee, to communicate with his attorneys. In April 2009, Judge John D. Bates ruled that Mr. al Maqaleh, and two other petitioners in the case, Amin al Bakri and Redha al Najar, have a Constitutional right to petition U.S. courts for a writ of habeas. Judge Bates’s decision was based on the Supreme Court’s decision in Boumediene v. Bush, which established that detainees held in U.S. custody at Guantanamo had a Constitutional right to file habeas corpus petitions in U.S. courts. But before any of the Bagram detainees could have their day in court, the Obama Administration appealed Judge Bates’s decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals—arguing that none of the 600 detainees at Bagram have any rights under U.S. law.
|