British Court Criticizes US Over Failure to Disclose Exculpatory Documents to Guantánamo Detainee

On October 22, 2008, a British appellate court criticized the U.S. government for failing to turn over intelligence documents that could help show a detainee’s confession was involuntary and resulted from torture. The judgment intimated that, unless the 42 documents showing Mohamed’s detention incommunicado for several years and his apparent were released to his counsel quickly as part of a habeas corpus proceeding in U.S. District Court, the British court might release the documents, even though such release would harm ties between the two nations. In particular, the court observed that the United States has said “it will reconsider the intelligence relationship with its oldest and closest ally if we, as a court in England and Wales, order the documents be provided...to enable justice to be done.”...[more]