Detainees May Be Denied Evidence for Defense

By Josh White / Washington Post

When Khalid Sheik Mohammed and other alleged co-conspirators in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks seek to represent themselves in military commissions trials in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba they may be barred from reviewing highly classified evidence and might not have access to the intelligence agents who interrogated them, according to the Pentagon's Office of Military Commissions.

The Justice Department has argued that the Supreme Court's decision last week granting the Guantanamo detainees the right to challenge their detentions in U.S. courts should not affect the military trials process. The department contends that the government plans to go ahead with military commissions for those who are facing war crimes charges.

Though the top legal adviser for the commissions process, Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas W. Hartmann, has said that the trials would be "fair, just and transparent" and that detainees would have full access to the evidence against them, Pentagon officials have now backed off of those claims. The Office of Military Commissions said last week that defendants representing themselves might not get access to information about their interrogators and that secret information might have to be redacted in order to be shared with them.

If classified information is presented to the jury, the accused will see it, no exceptions," according to the Office of Military Commissions' written responses to Washington Post questions about how the military commissions will deal with classified evidence in the Sept. 11 case.

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