Witness to Abuse - Human Rights Watch

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a right to counsel. Before interrogating material witnesses, federal officers must again inform them of their rights, including the right to counsel. • Court hearings and records in material witness cases should be presumptively open. The Justice Department should not seek to close hearings or seal records except to the limited extent that closure is the least restrictive means to further some other compelling government interest. To the Department of Justice Office of Professional Responsibility • Ensure that the FBI and U.S. Attorneys are not using the material witness law to circumvent probable cause and other requirements governing the arrest of criminal suspects. To the Inspector General • Initiate a review of the Department of Justice’s use of the material witness law in connection with terrorism investigations since September 11. To Congress To the Judiciary Committee • Request that the Justice Department update Congress on the status of all material witnesses arrested in connection with the September 11 terrorism investigations and provide their names, length of and basis for their detention and whether they testified. • Urge the Department of Justice Inspector General to investigate the misuse of the material witness law since September 11 to detain criminal suspects without charges. • Hold public hearings on the Department of Justice’s misuse of the material witness law to hold criminal suspects. To the House and Senate • Amend the material witness law to incorporate measures to prevent its misuse and to increase protections of the right to liberty, including: o strengthening the burden of proof that the government must meet to arrest and detain material witnesses; o establishing a specific time limit on the government’s ability to hold a material witness; HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH VOL. 17, NO. 2(G) 8
o requiring the government to inform witnesses of the basis of their detention upon their arrest and to provide them with a copy of the warrant and relevant evidence to support the request for a warrant; o requiring that material witnesses be detained in the least restrictive conditions possible. To the Judiciary • Ensure that the Department of Justice is not using the material witness law as a pretext to hold criminal suspects. • Refuse government requests to close hearings and seal court documents regarding material witness arrests or detentions. Proceedings should be public except where partial or full closure is the least restrictive means to furthering some compelling government interest. 9 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH VOL. 17, NO. 2(G)
Page 1 and 2: Human Rights Watch June 2005 Vol. 1
Page 3 and 4: Summary After I got in the cell I w
Page 5 and 6: were almost all the witnesses Musli
Page 7 and 8: combination with having worked in t
Page 9: Recommendations The recommendations
Page 13 and 14: eflects a compromise between an ind
Page 15 and 16: the witness for immigration or prob
Page 17 and 18: those suspected of committing a cri
Page 19 and 20: Arizona, and Florida, where the nin
Page 21 and 22: testimony—you get fingerprints, y
Page 23 and 24: The FBI appeared to believe that Ma
Page 25 and 26: interrogating him, without counsel,
Page 27 and 28: Jose Padilla On May 8, 2002, the Ju
Page 29 and 30: The Justice Department has often st
Page 31 and 32: criticism on the conduct of Assista
Page 33 and 34: government failed to take Diab’s
Page 35 and 36: Eric Sears, a former federal prosec
Page 37 and 38: sentencing. The judge finally got a
Page 39 and 40: accompanied by extensive searches c
Page 41 and 42: and young children. 121 He was deta
Page 43 and 44: High Security Conditions of Detenti
Page 45 and 46: Harassment and Abuse in Jail Many m
Page 47 and 48: uised. See id. In the elevator, the
Page 49 and 50: In practice, then, court approval o
Page 51 and 52: I kept asking what am I being charg
Page 53 and 54: As Mark Foster, the lawyer for one
Page 55 and 56: Federal marshals transferred the ei
Page 57 and 58: [T]he government filed all their pa
Page 59 and 60: Federal agents have also refused to
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In many cases, the trauma of forcef
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In January 2002, another hotel gues
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abuse, international human rights 2
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It is not clear why the courts have
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Things go on behind those doors tha
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providing interviews, submitting to
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Detaining Witnesses Who Cooperate w
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stayed with the FBI agents for eigh
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government, “I’m not coming.”
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armed forces for several years and
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Congress included the deposition re
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X. Haste, Incompetence, Prejudice:
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government’s basis was weak. Thes
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target, 272 the state police ordere
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Khan and Azmath were deported in Ja
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told them I told them I had no idea
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y subletting their apartment. Altho
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The post-scripts to the stories of
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I could not ask questions. What’s
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Ayub Ali Khan and Mohammad Azmath A
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get all these kinds of questions—
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Human Rights Watch and the American
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Witness to Abuse - Human Rights Watch

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