WASHINGTON — The Obama administration for the first time has transferred a Guantanamo Bay detainee into the United States, flying the suspect to New York early Tuesday to face federal charges in the 1998 East Africa embassy bombings.
U.S. marshals took custody of Ahmed Ghailani, a Tanzanian, at the military prison in Cuba and moved him to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan, officials said. Ghailani later pleaded not guilty in federal court.
Question of counsel
Wearing a blue prison uniform but no handcuffs, Ghailani was told he has a right to legal counsel and that he needs to fill out financial forms if he wants a court-appointed lawyer. His current civilian lawyer, Scott Fenstermaker, said he was withdrawing his pro bono representation, but officials said Fenstermaker could be tapped as the court-appointed attorney under the new system.
Asked by the judge how he wished to plead, Ghailani answered in English, “Not guilty.” When the judge asked whether he understood his right to counsel, the defendant replied, “I understand.”
Ghailani faces multiple charges and, if convicted, could face the death penalty for his role in the bombing of U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, which killed 224 people, including 12 Americans.
“With his appearance in federal court today, Ahmed Ghailani is being held accountable for his alleged role in the bombing of U.S. Embassies in Tanzania and Kenya and the murder of 224 people,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement.
Ghailani was indicted in New York before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, captured three years later and held in a secret CIA prison overseas before being placed in Guantanamo in 2006. Four of his named co-conspirators already have been tried and convicted and are serving life sentences in a super-maximum-security prison in Colorado.
The decision to move Ghailani to the United States lays down an important marker for the Obama administration, which wants to shut down the military prison but has faced congressional resistance to the transfer of any Guantanamo inmates into the United States for resettlement, trial or further detention.
It drew immediate criticism from congressional Republicans.
“The administration has made the decision to begin transferring these terrorists to the United States, in spite of the overwhelming opposition of the American people and serious questions from members of Congress of both parties,” said House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio.
Plenty of precedent
But Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., strongly defended Obama’s decision, noting that the U.S. already houses many accused terrorists in prisons around the country.
The Justice Department, sensitive to the criticism from opponents, said in a news release that there are 216 inmates in federal prisons who have connections to international terrorism and that there has never been an escape from the supermax facility in Florence, where many of them are held.
Thirty-three convicted terrorists are incarcerated at the Colorado prison, including shoe-bomber Richard Reid and Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, convicted of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the Justice Department said.
