9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and co-conspirators may avoid death penalty in new plea deal
The suspected main conspirator of the 9/11 terror attacks and his fellow defendants may never face the death penalty due to plea agreements being considered by the prosecution and defence lawyers.
The prosecution of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba has been repeatedly disrupted, especially due to legal reasons over their interrogation under torture that the men underwent while in CIA custody.
As a result of the delays, it has taken more than a decade to reach a verdict, as families of the September 2001 attack victims wait for a decision.
It was Mohammed who presented the idea of such an attack on the US to Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the United States’ 9/11 Commission concluded.
The investigation also found Mohammed received authorisation from bin Laden to mastermind the 9/11 attacks, while the four other men are alleged to have supported the hijackers in various ways.
The Pentagon and FBI sent the update of the plea consideration to several families of the victims in a letter.
It said: “The Office of the Chief Prosecutor has been negotiating and is considering entering into pre-trial agreements (PTAs).”
It told the families that while no plea agreement “has been finalised, and may never be finalised, it is possible that a PTA, in this case, would remove the possibility of the death penalty”.
The news came as a disappointment to the relatives of the nearly 3,000 people who were killed by the suicide attackers who hijacked planes, flying them into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon HQ in Washington and crashing one in a Pennsylvania field.
The World Trade Center shortly after the attack
‘Those guys are still alive. Our children are dead’
Jim Riches, who lost his son Jimmy in 9/11, went to Guantanamo for pre-trial hearings in 2009.
14 years later, his disillusionment was clear upon receiving the letter.
Mr Riches said: “How can you have any faith in it?”
“No matter how many letters they send, until I see it, I won’t believe it,” he said.
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He was initially open to the use of military tribunals but now feels that the process is failing and that the 9/11 defendants should be tried in civilian court.
Poignantly, he added: “Those guys are still alive. Our children are dead.”
Peter Brady, whose father was killed in the attack argued that the case needed to go through “the legal process” and not a plea deal.
It’s about “holding people responsible, and they’re taking that away with this plea,” Mr Brady said.
The five defendants were captured at various times and places in 2002 and 2003 and sent to Guantanamo for trial in 2006.
No date for a trial has been set.
Anti-Trump protests took place across America on Saturday, with demonstrators decrying the administration’s immigration crackdown and mass firings at government agencies.
Events ranged from small local marches to a rally in front of the White House and a demonstration at a Massachusetts commemoration of the start of the Revolutionary War 250 years ago.
Thomas Bassford, 80, was at the battle reenactment with his two grandsons, as well as his partner and daughter.
He said: “This is a very perilous time in America for liberty. I wanted the boys to learn about the origins of this country and that sometimes we have to fight for freedom.”
At events across the country, people carried banners with slogans including “Trump fascist regime must go now!”, “No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state,” and “Fight fiercely, Harvard, fight,” referencing the university’s recent refusal to hand over much of its control to the government.
Some signs name-checked Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadorian citizen living in Maryland, who the Justice Department admits was mistakenly deported to his home country.
Read more: Donald Trump’s deportations explained
Pic: AP
People waved US flags, some of them held upside down to signal distress. In San Francisco, hundreds of people spelt out “Impeach & Remove” on a beach, also with an inverted US flag.
People walked through downtown Anchorage in Alaska with handmade signs listing reasons why they were demonstrating, including one that read: “No sign is BIG enough to list ALL of the reasons I’m here!”
Pic: AP
Protests also took place outside Tesla car dealerships against the role Elon Musk ahas played in downsizing the federal government as de facto head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The protests come just two weeks after similar nationwide demonstrations.
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Organisers are opposing what they call Mr Trump’s civil rights violations and constitutional violations, including efforts to deport scores of immigrants and to scale back the federal government by firing thousands of government workers and effectively shuttering entire agencies.
The Trump administration, among other things, has moved to shutter Social Security Administration field offices, cut funding for government health programs and scale back protections for transgender people.
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