Word: moussaoui
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...military court in the first place, or is the case going exactly the way it should for a government that may have overplayed its hand in the zeal to show it was combatting terrorism? It's unclear whether anyone could have foreseen the twists and turns, such as Moussaoui becoming his own counsel, that began to unravel the government's case. But the case now is pivotal for another reason: it has become a showdown between the basic right of criminal defendants to prove their innocence and national-security concerns that can affect the lives of many others. Here...
After the terrorist attacks, investigators discovered that Moussaoui, who had lived in London and had a master's degree from South Bank University, had recently been to Pakistan and Malaysia and had spent time at a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan. Moreover, in a notebook he had the German phone number and alias of Ramzi Binalshibh, a key orchestrator of the 9/11 attacks and, like the hijackers, had been wired funds...
...from the start, the government's case against Moussaoui was utterly circumstantial, and the connection between the hijackers and him was mainly inferred from their similar profiles. In fact, sources tell TIME, the FBI has long believed that Moussaoui played no part in the 9/11 scheme and was only a minor player in al-Qaeda. Still, the Justice Department's December 2001 indictment laid out in chilling detail the 19 hijackers' activities in the months leading up to Sept. 11, alongside Moussaoui's doings over a similar time frame. Their tracks were roughly parallel, but direct contact between Moussaoui...
That the government would seek the death penalty was never in serious doubt, though prosecutors did not ask for it formally until the following March. What was in play until nearly the day of the indictment was whether Moussaoui would be charged in federal court or would become the first defendant in the new military-tribunal system that Bush authorized in November. The Pentagon fought for control of the case, but the Justice Department, led by criminal-division chief Michael Chertoff, won out, wanting to show that the U.S. criminal-justice system could handle a major terrorism case...
...April 22, 2002, all parties to the case assembled before Judge Brinkema in Alexandria, Va., for what was supposed to be a routine motion hearing. But when federal public defender Frank Dunham identified himself and co-counsels as present for the defense, Moussaoui jumped in: "No, I am sorry to note they are not anymore my lawyer...