Guantanamo prosecutors call trials a "fraud"

August 1, 2005

According to leaked emails, two former prosecutors allege that the US military commissions at Guantanamo Bay are fraudulent and rigged.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that one prosecutor, Major Robert Preston, wrote that the process was perpetrating a fraud on the American public."I consider the insistence on pressing ahead with cases that would be marginal even if properly prepared to be a severe threat to the reputation of the military justice system and even a fraud on the American people," Maj Preston wrote. "Surely they don't expect that this fairly half-assed effort is all that we have been able to put together after all this time."

Captain John Carr, the second prosecutor, wrote to his supervisor: "You have repeatedly said to the office that the military panel will be handpicked and will not acquit these detainees and that we only needed to worry about building a record for the review panel."

"There is absolutely no evidence that it is rigged." Brig Gen Hemingway stated in defence to these claims, "In each of the four cases which have been referred, the appointing authority John Alterburgh made an independent determination that the evidence was sufficient to warrant trial."