Court: Terrorists Held Overseas Not Due Habeas

Cully Stimson / May 21, 2010

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals just issued a blockbuster opinion that vindicates both the Bush and Obama administration’s positions regarding whether detainees captured overseas and held in Afghanistan have the constitutional right to challenge their detention via habeas corpus. The appeals court, in a methodical opinion reversing a lower court decision, said no.  The opinion will have wide-ranging implications in the war on terror, and if it holds (i.e. is not taken up by the Supreme Court and overturned), it gives the green light to an administration which has, to date, been reluctant to capture high value detainees outside of Afghanistan.

The case involved three detainees who are being held at the Bagram Theatre Internment Facility on the Bagram Airfield Military Base in Afghanistan. Each detainee claimed that he was captured outside of Afghanistan, and brought to Bagram for detention. The detainees claimed that, pursuant to the holding in a recent Supreme Court case (Boumediene v. Bush), that they had a constitutional right to habeas. (more…)