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9/11 Defendant Not Fit for Death-Penalty Trial, Judge Rules [1]

['Carol Rosenberg', 'More About Carol Rosenberg']

Date: 2023-09-21  

A military judge ruled on Thursday that a defendant in the Sept. 11 case who was tortured by the C.I.A. was ineligible for a death-penalty trial, adopting a finding that the prisoner was too psychologically damaged to help defend himself.

Col. Matthew N. McCall, the judge, disqualified Ramzi bin al-Shibh, 51, from what had been a five-defendant conspiracy case in an 11-page ruling on Thursday evening.

Mr. bin al-Shibh was charged as an accomplice in the attacks that killed 2,976 people, and is accused of helping organize a cell of hijackers in Hamburg, Germany, whose leader commandeered Flight No. 11 and flew it into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.

The judge ordered pretrial proceedings to continue on Friday with Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who is accused of being the mastermind of the plot, and the other three defendants but excluded Mr. bin al-Shibh from the hearing.

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[1] Url: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/21/us/politics/september-11-guantanamo-torture.html

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