Guantánamo Judge Proceeds With Military Commissions In Defiance Of Obama Order

The American Civil Liberties Union has sponsored civilian counsel for some of the detainees through its John Adams Project, a partnership with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers to assist under-resourced military counsel at Guantánamo.

The following can be attributed to Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the ACLU:

"Judge Henley apparently doesn't know what the word 'halt' means since he has blatantly defied President Obama's executive order for an end to the military commissions. Why Judge Henley accepted pleadings and issued an order in halted proceedings is confounding. The judge's actions extending the military commissions call into question the true intentions of the Pentagon leadership at a time when the Obama administration is searching for a solution to the disastrous detention policies of the Bush administration. If Defense Secretary Gates allowed the military commissions to proceed, that's a serious problem; if he didn't know about this, that's equally troubling.