GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba — The behavior of the five defendants charged with orchestrating the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks during their arraignment Saturday was a form of “peaceful resistance to an unjust system,” said one of their lawyers at a news conference Sunday.
“The accused refuse to acknowledge the legitimacy of the military commissions,” said James Connell, a lawyer for Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali. The “arraignment demonstrates that this will be a long, hard-fought but peaceful struggle against secrecy, torture and the misguided institution of the military commission.”
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four co-defendants refused to speak during the 10-hour hearing Saturday, which included a reading of the capital charges, including murder in violation of the law of war, hijacking and terrorism.
The defendants prayed demonstratively in court, read magazines, shouted at the judge and whispered constantly to one another.
“They are complaining, and our families can’t complain,” said Eddie Bracken, a New Yorker who lost his sister in the attacks on the World Trade Center and came to Guantanamo Bay for the arraignment. “But it’s our justice, and they have rights. … It’s hurtful because they have no remorse. I don’t think they have any souls.”
The chief military prosecutor, Brig. Gen. Mark Martins, noted that disruptive behavior is not new to courts but that judges tend to be “careful about employing the ultimate sanction of expulsion, choosing instead to build a patient and methodical record and moving the case forward while preparing the ground for eventual expulsion.”
Among the other remarked-on occurrences at the arraignment was the appearance of one of the female defense attorneys, Cheryl Bormann, in a full-length black abaya that showed only her face.
Bormann, who is from Chicago, refused to comment on reports that she had received death threats in the wake of the arraignment and said she wore the abaya in deference to the cultural and religious sensitivities of her client, Walid bin Attash.
Bormann also asked in court that a female member of the prosecution team dress more modestly because her clothing was a distraction for the defendants and might cause them to “commit a sin” by looking at her. Three women on the prosecution side wore knee-length skirts.
Martins said the request wasn’t worthy of a response.
