German Court Orders New Trial for 9/11 Suspect

[jimnyc]

BERLIN, March 4 -- A German appeals court on Thursday ordered a new trial for the only person to be convicted for a role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, saying the proceeding had been compromised by a U.S. refusal to provide access to a key witness.

Defense attorneys for Mounir Motassadeq, a Moroccan citizen, had repeatedly asked for testimony from Ramzi Binalshibh, who is in secret U.S. custody. U.S. officials have called Binalshibh a central conspirator in the attacks but declined to produce him for the trial, citing national security concerns.

The appeals decision Thursday was a new setback for German prosecutors as they try to convict what they have said are remnants of an al Qaeda cell that was based in the port city of Hamburg. One month ago, a court there acquitted another Moroccan, Abdelghani Mzoudi, on charges of aiding the hijackers. In that case, the chief judge also cited the lack of access to witnesses being held by the United States.

The appeals court found Thursday that the Hamburg court that convicted Motassadeq had not adequately considered the implications of the absence of evidence from Binalshibh.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...washpost/20040305/ts_washpost/a29401_2004mar4

 

[Comrade]

The really interesting part of this whole story is that Z.M. in US court called on Motassadeq as a character witness. So if we have to have Binalshibh vouch for Motassadeq and then so on pretty soon we have the whole crew with Osama himself vouching for all of them.


Then we have a good old fashioned lynching outside of the courthouse. So go Germany!