Evidence
EVIDENCE....Why is the FBI working so vigorously to "reconstruct" the legal case against Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and 14 other accused Al Qaeda leaders being held at Guantanamo Bay? Josh Meyer of the LA Times explains the genesis of the investigations:
They were requested by the Defense Department shortly after legal rulings indicated that Mohammed — the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks — and the other Al Qaeda suspects probably would win some form of trial in which evidence would have to be presented, according to senior federal law enforcement officials.Indeed. Trials in which "evidence would have to be presented" are a bothersome problem, aren't they? Needless to say, torture is at the bottom of all this:
By mid-2002, several former agents and senior bureau officials said, they had begun complaining that the CIA-run interrogation program amounted to torture and was going to create significant problems down the road — particularly if the Bush administration was ever forced to allow the Al Qaeda suspects to face their accusers in court.But it wasn't all for nothing. We got plenty of false confessions out of the deal too....."Those guys were using techniques that we didn't even want to be in the room for," one senior federal law enforcement official said. "The CIA determined they were going to torture people, and we made the decision not to be involved."
A senior FBI official who since has retired said he also complained about the lack of usable evidence and admissible statements being gathered. "We knew there were going to be problems back then. But nobody was listening," he said. "Now they have to live with the policy that they have adopted. I don't know if anyone thought of the consequences."