The University of New Hampshire Law Review
Abstract
[Excerpt] “When the first military commission proceedings began in July 2004, the Bush Administration identified fifteen Guantanamo Bay detainees subject to the military commissions. Subsequently, Bush Administration officials asserted that they had evidence to move forward with between sixty and eighty cases within the commission system. But, by the time President George W. Bush left office in early 2009, the commissions had resolved only three cases.
Upon taking office, President Barack Obama initially suspended the military commission proceedings in the thirteen cases in which charges were pending, but, in May 2009, he announced his intention to move forward with some commission trials at Guantanamo Bay. In January 2009, the Obama Administration’s Guantanamo Review Task Force reported that it had identified thirty-six cases slated for prosecution. On November 13, 2009, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the government would pursue civilian court prosecutions of the five defendants accused of conspiring to commit the 9/11 attacks and military commissions for five other detainees. Over a year later, military commissions have resolved only three additional cases, all resulting in plea deals, and there have been only sporadic proceedings in any pending cases.”
Repository Citation
Devon Chaffee, Military Commissions Revived: Persisting Problems of Perception, 9 U.N.H. L. REV. 237 (2011), available at http://scholars.unh.edu/unh_lr/vol9/iss2/7