CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

Criminal Law Blog by Defense Lawyer John Floyd and Mr. Billy Sinclair

April 17, 2011

UNDER SIEGE-A SOCIETY CONSUMED BY FEAR

Filed under: Anti-Terrorism Lawyer — Tags: , , , , , — johntfloyd @ 10:42 am

Guilt by Association: Politically Inspired Fear of Muslims Continues to Infect Politics, Law Enforcement Investigations and Potential Jurors

By: Houston Criminal Lawyer John Floyd and Paralegal Billy Sinclair

The month of March was saturated with state and national news events which seem to underscore an unfortunate point about Texas and America: we are a society under siege from fear of those we do not understand and, therefore, do not trust. The Ides of March began when New York’s Republican Congressman Rep. Peter King decided to conduct hearings on the threat of “radical Islam” in America. The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee defended his congressional inquiry into the “role” the “American Muslim community” has played in what’s become known as “homegrown terrorism.”

“There is nothing radical or un-American about holding these hearings,” Rep. King announced to the overflow hearing room filled with journalists and concerned citizens as well as protesters. King conjured up the Fort Hood, Texas shooting rampage by a Muslim soldier and the media-proclaimed “Ft. Dix Six” who had planned a terrorist attack in New Jersey. According to the vocal New York conservative political leader, this was enough evidence to warrant an “investigation” into the role the entire American Muslim community is playing in these kinds of terrorism activities. “This committee cannot live in denial,” Rep. King continued, saying he would not bow to “political correctness” in his determined pursuit of “every Red under the bed” as the legendary Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy would have said.

A group of 50 Democrats, including two Muslims, had tried before the hearings convened to get Rep. King to cancel them. The Democratic group told King that “singling out one religious group and blaming the actions of individuals on an entire community is not only unfair, it is unwise – and it will not make our country any safer.”

Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), one of the longest serving members of Congress and whose district includes Dearborn, Michigan, a city where a large Arab-American population resides, was even more direct with his criticism: “They are loyal, honorable Americans, they hold elected office, they have immigrated to our state from all over the United States. They are as much distressed as we are about what’s going on.”

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March 26, 2010

OBAMA and MCCAIN: FORMER PRESIDENTIAL RIVALS EMBRACE TORTURE AND ASSASSINATION

Filed under: Anti-Terrorism Lawyer — Tags: , , , , — johntfloyd @ 5:29 pm

Continuing Bush’s War on Terror, Obama Continues Policy of Unfettered Presidential Power to Assassinate Americans Abroad and McCain Sponsorsthe Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010

By: Houston Criminal Attorney John Floyd and Paralegal Billy Sinclair

Sen. John McCain was once an honorable man, a respected “war hero,” and a “maverick” politician who stood on principle before political expediency. In 2000 the Arizona senator waged a “maverick” campaign for the Republican presidential nomination from inside his Straight Talk Express bus and stunned the nation with a convincing victory over heavily favorite Texas Gov. George W. Bush in the New Hampshire primary. He became an instant media “darling” who suddenly had the respect and admiration of most moderate Republicans and independents. The Vietnam “war hero” had taken on the Republican Party establishment and won.

Then came South Carolina—a primary election battle that would change McCain and he would never quite be the same again. Republican Party insiders, and their South Carolina operatives, gutted McCain’s seemingly impenetrable “war hero” stature and seriously damaged his “maverick” political persona. They did it with a smear campaign The New York Times described as a “painful symbol of the brutality of American politics.” The smear campaign included unfounded charges that McCain “abandoned” veterans on POW/MIA and Agent Orange issues; that he fathered a black child out of wedlock; that he was a homosexual and his wife a drug addict; and that he was either mentally unstable because of his POW experiences or a traitorous “Manchurian Candidate.”

While the mainstream media did not give much serious coverage to the smear charges, the inherent problem about playing in mud is that you get muddy. Bush trounced McCain in the South Carolina primary and went on to assume his family-gifted presidency. McCain was a thoroughly whipped political puppy who had effectively disenfranchised himself from the Republican Party base, that is until the 9/11 terror attacks brought down New York City’s Twin Towers. In the wake of this worst-ever terror attack on American soil which resulted in a Bush declared “war on terror” and the invasion of two countries, Afghanistan and Iraq, Sen. John McCain had a new, invigorated political mission: he would be a “hawk” on the wars being fought on two fronts by American troops and he would lead the nation into the unchartered constitutional waters in its first-ever “war on terror.”

To his political credit, Sen. McCain voiced criticism of the use of “torture” on terror suspects captured by American authorities during the Bush era. As a former prisoner of war in North Vietnam and the victim of horrendous torture by North Vietnamese military officials, McCain become the most compelling moral voice against the practice of torture, such as water boarding, when it was advocated and condoned at the highest levels in the Bush administration, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

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December 28, 2009

ARGUMENT AGAINST GITMO CLOSURE DEFEATED BY ACT OF TERRORISM

Filed under: Federal Crimes Lawyer — Tags: , , , , , — johntfloyd @ 1:04 pm

Recent Arrest, Detention and Charging of Attempted Airplane Bomber Illustrate Fed’s Ability to Handle Terror Suspects in Civilian Courts

By: Houston Criminal Attorney John Floyd and Paralegal Billy Sinclair

Two recent decisions by President Obama’s administration has drawn intense criticism designed to manipulate the natural fear Americans have of terrorism since 9/11: the decision to try the 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), and his co-conspirators, in a New York federal civilian court and the decision to transfer “terror suspects” currently housed at the U.S. detention facility (“Gitmo”) in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to the Thomson Correctional Center in Thomson, Illinois.

The critics, fueled primarily by a Republican political agenda to undermine the Obama administration and regain future control of the White House and Congress, have charged that confining and trying terror suspects on American soil would somehow endanger the American public with future terror attacks. If these charges were not so politically motivated and so readily accepted by many Americans, who believe every word launched out of the mouths of conservative wing nuts like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, they could be casually dismissed laughably ludicrous.

The Christmas Day attempted terror attack on a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines flight by 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab who allegedly attempted to detonate the high explosive pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) as the plane approached the Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport for landing underscores this point. The Abdulmutallab terror attack was thwarted because his detonator either malfunctioned, or he did not correctly use it, and by the heroic efforts of fellow passengers who attacked and subdued the terrorist before he could fulfill his objective: to blow up an American plane on American soil on Christmas Day.

This attempted terror attack illustrate precisely why the politically-motivated criticisms of the decision to try KSM in federal civilian court and to house Gitmo prisoners in a super-max federal penal facility are in fact so wrong-headed. Abdulmutallab was charged in federal district court the day after Christmas. The United States Justice Department issued the following “press release” entitled “Nigerian National Charged with Attempting to Destroy Northwest Airlines Aircraft:”

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November 18, 2009

THE AGONIZING GITMO DILEMMA

Filed under: Anti-Terrorism Lawyer — Tags: , , , , , — johntfloyd @ 5:04 am

Enemy Combatant Cases in Federal Courts Chart Uncertain Path

By Houston Criminal Attorney John Floyd and Paralegal Billy Sinclair

On January 22, 2009, just days after assuming the presidency, Barak Obama announced that he would close the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention facility where hundreds “suspected terrorists” have been held for years without trial under an official Bush-administration created designation “enemy combatant.” Civil libertarians and prominent constitutional scholars have long advocated the closure of the facility while political conservatives have fought hard in the trenches to keep the internationally-criticized torture facility open.

A liberal policy think tank called Center for American Progress, a staunch ally of the Obama administration, charged in a recently released report that the administration has made a series of blunders following the President’s January 22nd Gitmo closure announcement. The report, authored by Ken Gude, a scholar for the Center, says these blunders will delay Gitmo’s ultimate closure for months. The most significant blunders, the report charged, was the administration’s failure to have enough people in place to handle the difficult closure process and misleading Congress about its intentions.

The Obama administration assigned two task forces to deal with the Gitmo dilemma: one to examine the overall “detention policy” of suspected terrorists and the second to review the files of more than 200 detainees to determine whether they should be prosecuted in federal civilian courts or by military commissions. The most high-profile of these “enemy combatants” were Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks who has been in custody since March 2003, and four of his co-conspirators—all of whom will now be tried in the United States District Court in the Southern District of New York based on a recent decision by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

Just last month President Obama signed the Military Commissions Act of 2009 (officially titled the 2010 National Defense Authorization Act) which changes—but some would argue does not actually improve—the rules governing the military commissions created in 2006 to hear terrorism cases. In 2006 then-Sen. Obama, and 33 other U.S. senators, voted against the “military commission’s law,” calling it a “flawed document” that ran counter to American values. (more…)

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