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Hicks Pleads Guilty

The Fool said:
Lol.... Maybe they were fattening him up?

Cannibalism at Gitmo...you heard it here first :)
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So the tan he is sporting is really baste?

I wonder how much useful information they got out of Hicks and whether he would really have been dangerous if they hadn't kept him locked up for so long.

If the answer is, respectively, not much and not particularly then I wonder why they have wasted so much money and so much political capital on him.
 
gtc said:
So the tan he is sporting is really baste?

I wonder how much useful information they got out of Hicks and whether he would really have been dangerous if they hadn't kept him locked up for so long.

If the answer is, respectively, not much and not particularly then I wonder why they have wasted so much money and so much political capital on him.
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When you say 'we' you mean John Howard. It just shows to what extent John Howard will go to get what he perceived to be a political advantage. At first it was seen as a good thing, we Australians had a genuine terrorist caught by our friends in the WOT. Then it turned out he was going to be tried by a kangaroo court, that he hadn't actually done anything in the way of terrorist attacks, and Britain had had all it's citizens released, Howard had a problem.

The first rule for Howard is never admit you are wrong, so all he could do was sit on the problem, and hope the US would finally come up with a trial system that was in some way constitutional even by it's own standards.

As it is, it looks like he has been 'mean and tricky' one time too many, he could fight his way back from being the underdog in the previous election, this time everyone's just had too much of him.
 
gtc said:
So the tan he is sporting is really baste?

I wonder how much useful information they got out of Hicks and whether he would really have been dangerous if they hadn't kept him locked up for so long.

If the answer is, respectively, not much and not particularly then I wonder why they have wasted so much money and so much political capital on him.
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Don't forget...he is "the worst of the worst"...

I can't begin to imagine the feeding frenzy of TV programmes and magazines when he gets back here... It will be a circus...
 
SezMe said:
I have read that "Australia does not have a constitutional prohibition against ex post facto laws". Is that right?
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I am not sure. Even if that is the case, ex post facto laws may still not be allowed.

I understand that Hicks' actions would be illegal under Australian law today, but weren't illegal then. Which is why he hasn't been tried in Australia.

The Fool said:
Don't forget...he is "the worst of the worst"...
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RANT! I am not sure that he is the worst of the worst. He has (or had) odious beliefs (not least of which was the anti-semitism expressed in the letters to his Dad) and abandoned his family (including children) to actively and violently pursue those beliefs in service of even more odious people. Furthermore, it strikes me as ridiculous to see the number of people from groups that Hicks would have violently oppossed (i.e gays and feminists) among his supporters. I wonder why they don't spend as much time opposing the oppression of homosexuals and women in (for instance) Middle Eastern countries. Finally, I can't imagine anyone giving a damn about the man had he been released 2 years ago (anyone remember Mamdouh Habib?) or even if he had been shot while "resisting" capture.


That said, he has been much more effective for his cause as a 'martyr' than he would have been militarily. I am not sure that stubborness from Howard explains it.

The Fool said:
I can't begin to imagine the feeding frenzy of TV programmes and magazines when he gets back here... It will be a circus...
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Today tonight or ACA?
 
SezMe said:
I have read that "Australia does not have a constitutional prohibition against ex post facto laws". Is that right?
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Thats correct....but we are much closer to the British model than the American model constitutionally where convention and precedence rule the day . Our constitution, which is smaller than the instructions that came with my last electric shaver, does not even mention the position of Prime Minister either. Our whole current executive branch did not exist when our constitution was written and is built apon convention precedence and all those other wonderfull rickety principles of a westminster system. so no specific mention of ex post facto is not surprising.

There is a strong presumption against retroactive application of law in the Australian legal system. Hints of ex post facto effects are routinely chucked out by the Judiciary. Common law principles and concepts like "natural justice" also gets in the way of ex post facto rubbish.
 
gtc said:
RANT! I am not sure that he is the worst of the worst. He has (or had) odious beliefs (not least of which was the anti-semitism expressed in the letters to his Dad) and abandoned his family (including children) to actively and violently pursue those beliefs in service of even more odious people. Furthermore, it strikes me as ridiculous to see the number of people from groups that Hicks would have violently oppossed (i.e gays and feminists) among his supporters. I wonder why they don't spend as much time opposing the oppression of homosexuals and women in (for instance) Middle Eastern countries. Finally, I can't imagine anyone giving a damn about the man had he been released 2 years ago (anyone remember Mamdouh Habib?) or even if he had been shot while "resisting" capture.
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I was being sarcastic.....unlike me to do that :)

if this guy is the worst of the worst we are fairly safe. From what I read he couldn't run a raffle let alone mastermind a terrorist plot.
 
SezMe said:
I have read that "Australia does not have a constitutional prohibition against ex post facto laws". Is that right?
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IIRC, we don't, some tax dodges have been caught that way, with retroactive laws.

Yes, it has happened.

From wikipedia.

  • Australia - Australia has no strong constitutional prohibition on ex post facto laws, though narrow retroactive laws may violate constitutional separation of powers principles. Courts do interpret statutes with a strong presumption that they do not apply retroactively. Retroactive laws designed to combat tax avoidance were passed in the early 1980s by the Fraser government (see Bottom of the harbour tax avoidance).
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The good old bottom of the harbour tax dodge. Build up a huge tax bill with a company, shut it down, destroy the records, (or as the name implies, throw them down to the bottom of Sydney Harbour), and start up a new company doing exactly the same business with no tax liabilities. When you consider the number of items and people consigned to that body of water, I'm surprised you can't walk across it by now.
 
The Fool said:
You are quite correct that Hicks is not due the protections of a US citizen or resident alien...so he is also not due the obligations of a US citizen or resident alien. If he was a US citizen or US resident alien I would have nothing but support for the US applying US laws to him.......but if using that law is impossible due to the laws not applying I find it difficult to call not putting your hands up to them a "loophole".
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Under the Laws of International Armed Conflict the occupying power is required to apply and enforce their laws on the occupied state. This includes any and all detainees.

In the example of Afghanistan the occupying power was the United States of America and its coalition partners, thus any suspected criminals (be they illegal combatants or POWs that committed crimes, or civilians commiting crimes) must be charged under either international or US law.

-Gumboot
 
Thanks to The Fool and AUP for the info regarding ex post facto laws. I am reminded again of my charter membership in the Ugly American Society. That is, if you don't conduct yourselves like, us, what is wrong with you. I appreciate the education and can now follow the Hicks case with more clarity. I will be especially interested to follow what happens to him when he is returned to his home country.
 
gumboot said:
Under the Laws of International Armed Conflict the occupying power is required to apply and enforce their laws on the occupied state. This includes any and all detainees.

In the example of Afghanistan the occupying power was the United States of America and its coalition partners, thus any suspected criminals (be they illegal combatants or POWs that committed crimes, or civilians commiting crimes) must be charged under either international or US law.

-Gumboot
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Can you site the International law he is charged with breaking?

The law he is charged with did not exist during the US Invasion and occupation of Afghanistan. Hicks cannot and has not been charged with any civil crimes in occupied territories...well, they could try but a US criminal court may object to the lack of evidence.

All charges have collapsed except for the ex post facto. They didn't collapse because the US got bored with them. They collapsed for one or more of three main reasons........ No evidence, Law deemed not to apply or the judicial structure created to put in in place was flawed.

so write a law to make something someone did a crime.....Not killing anyone or making bombs or planning or assisting in the planning of any terrorist attack. "Providing material support". A blind incontinent taliban army cook could be charged with that.
 
Meanwhile in Iran, British sailors admit to breaking international law, by illegally entering Iranian waters.

In London, any hope that this was a simple misunderstanding is all but gone. Britain has always insisted that the eight sailors and seven marines were "well inside" Iraqi waters and the Ministry of Defence today released their coordinates as proof. But, in a clear response, Iranian state television broadcast an interview with captured British sailor Faye Turney in which she appears to admit that she and the 14 other servicemen were trespassing.
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http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1604283,00.html?xid=site-cnn-partner
 
a_unique_person said:
Meanwhile in Iran, British sailors admit to breaking international law, by illegally entering Iranian waters.



http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1604283,00.html?xid=site-cnn-partner
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Amazing. In a thread where you complain about the rights of a combatant who did not qualify for protected status under Article 4 you have not a word to say about captured POW's (in the full legal sense of Article 4) who are being paraded around in a public spectacle, threatened with being charged as spies, and forced to say things for propaganda (which you accept as the truth without question).

This is a new low for you.
 
WildCat said:
Amazing. In a thread where you complain about the rights of a combatant who did not qualify for protected status under Article 4 you have not a word to say about captured POW's (in the full legal sense of Article 4) who are being paraded around in a public spectacle, threatened with being charged as spies, and forced to say things for propaganda (which you accept as the truth without question).

This is a new low for you.
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No, a new low for you, keep your insults to yourself. The point was, they 'confessed' under duress.
 
a_unique_person said:
No, a new low for you, keep your insults to yourself. The point was, they 'confessed' under duress.
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No, the point went right over your head.The US did not violate the Geneva Conventions as far as Hicks is concerned. Hicks wore no uniform, fought for a group that does not abide by the laws and customs of war, wear an insignia visible from a distance, does not carry arms openly, or have a command structure such that commanders are responsible for their subordinates.

The British taken prisoner were in uniform, openly carried arms, conduct themselves according to the laws and customs of war, and have commanders responsible for their subordinates.

Iran is in direct violation of the GC by parading them in front of cameras, denying access by the Red Cross, and by threatening to charge them as spies. And this doesn't bother you one bit, and you go so far as to compare the two.
 
WildCat said:
No, the point went right over your head.The US did not violate the Geneva Conventions as far as Hicks is concerned. Hicks wore no uniform, fought for a group that does not abide by the laws and customs of war, wear an insignia visible from a distance, does not carry arms openly, or have a command structure such that commanders are responsible for their subordinates.

The British taken prisoner were in uniform, openly carried arms, conduct themselves according to the laws and customs of war, and have commanders responsible for their subordinates.

Iran is in direct violation of the GC by parading them in front of cameras, denying access by the Red Cross, and by threatening to charge them as spies. And this doesn't bother you one bit, and you go so far as to compare the two.
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You can raise any points you want, I made a point, about confessions obtained under duress. If you want to respond to that you can, otherwise, WTF are you on about? Debating something with me that I never raised?
 
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