What principles drove you to get involved with cases in such a difficult
time in Guantanamo Bay.
Well, thank you, senator. And I do want to clarify. When I first
started working on these cases I was an assistant federal public
defender.
Um
The Supreme Court in 2000 and four
Issued two opinions that began this group of cases in these issues,
and this was in the wake of
The tragic and terrible attack on this country in 9 11.
And the executives use of authority to detain enemy combatants at
Guantanamo bag.
In 2000 and four, the Supreme Court ruled.
That
The executive did have the authority to make those detentions.
In one case and then in another case, the Supreme Court ruled.
That anyone so detained could file a legal challenge.
They had habeas rights. And as you know, habeas is in the Constitution.
In 2000 and five I joined the federal Public defender's office and
those cases started coming in.
The requests from detainees asking for legal representation consistent
with our constitutional scheme.
To have helped to file their habeas petitions. This was very early
in the days of these kinds of legal actions. There was a lot unknown.
About what these petitions could look like. What arguments could
be made and considered by the court and and perhaps, most importantly,
what the facts were
Related to any of these individuals because almost everything was
classified. So defense counsel was getting these these people in
with no information.
I was in the appellate division of my office and as an appellate
defender, I worked on legal issues. I was paired with my I was assigned
by the federal Public defender. I was an assistant federal public
defender.
And I was paired with a trial defender who attempted to do the fact
gathering who traveled to Guantanamo Bay. I never traveled there
anything like that. I worked on the law.
And as you noted, the law was very uncertain. This was brand new
And people were trying to figure out what are the limits of executive
authority. In this context, we knew
That the constitution was not suspended.
Even though we had this emergency, So what did that mean? With respect
to these individuals?
I filed as a federal public defender.
I was assigned to work on four cases.
And I filed almost identical petitions. Because what you're doing,
especially when you have no facts is just preserving legal arguments
for your clients that is consistent with what
Lawyers do
Um And then you mentioned private practice, so I went into private
practice and believe it was 2000 and seven.
And by that time, lots of private
Practices around the country had started taking on these cases because
there were lots of people who needed representation and so pro bono
practices were receiving requests.
Um, usually through nonprofits.
And
One of the individuals that I had represented as a defender.
Ended up being assigned to my firm. Unbeknownst to me, so I arrive
at my firm.
And the partners realized that the same person
Um, was someone that according to the docket I had previously represented
and they asked if I would review some of his materials and continue
the representation.
That was the only person that I represented in the context of my
private firm who was a detainee. Um, I worked on a couple of habeas
briefs for
Judges and for, um, a variety of of nonprofits, including the Rutherford
Institute, the Cato Institute in the Constitution Project.
Um, who were all interested in making arguments to the Supreme Court?