Terrorist released from Gitmo returns to crime

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Abdullah Mehsud, a former Guantanamo Bay prisoner released by the U.S., turned right around and kidnapped two Chinese engineers in Pakistan:

The former prisoners include Abdullah Mehsud, accused by Pakistani authorities of overseeing the recent kidnapping of two Chinese engineers, one of whom was killed. On Friday, Pakistani soldiers began a massive search for Mehsud, 28, who returned to Pakistan in March after about two years’ detention at Guantanamo. Pakistan officials said he has forged ties with al Qaeda since then.

This blunder reminds me of the 1999 incident when India released three Kashmiri militants in exchange for hostages on a hijacked Indian Airlines jet, IC-814. One of the men released, Maulana Masood Azhar, then masterminded the 2001 attack on the Indian Parliament which brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war.

10 thoughts on “Terrorist released from Gitmo returns to crime”

  1. I’m curious what the Terrorist recidivism rate is vs. the general criminal one (62%). The nature of terrorism vs. your normal street crime does imply that we should err more on the side of locking ’em up & throwing away the key…

  2. The Indian Airlines hijacking also resulting in India releasing the terrorist who would later go on to kill Daniel Pearl. So, can we expect an “Ooops, we did it again” from the anti-Gitmo crowd?

  3. I’m finishing up law school – it’s an understatement to say that I look at the American criminal justice system with an incredibly jaundiced eye.

    Gitmo is not analogous to the American legal system (not that I’m any less cynical.) They rounded up a bunch of people – some of whom are terrorists, and others who happen to have incredibly common names, be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Now, they are sorting them out. The people who are being released are not done serving their time or out on parole, etc. – they are people who the U.S. has decided, apparently incorrectly at times, are not terrorists.

  4. Deepa – the analogy w/ criminal justice / detention was supposed to be a very limited one.

    Specifically – given all the “advantages” we have in criminal prosecution (willingness to prosecute after the crime, CSI, detailed records, etc.), the system still ‘suffers’ from a very high recidivism rate (>60%).

    BUT, in the “crime war”, we accept the social cost of erring on the side of the rights of the accused / convicted and let folks out “early” (in a sense) despite knowing that 60% of the time, a crime could be prevented by simply keeping the guy locked up for longer.

    Now given the adverse aspects of War on Terror (no records on people in foreign countries, the intrinsic difficulty of trying to catch people BEFORE the crime (e.g. the next 9/11), etc.), what sort of recidivism would you expect of folks thrown into & later released from Gitmo?

    10%? 20%? 50%?

    In lieu of crystal balls & given the intrinsic difficulties, in the terror war, we’re probably going to err on the side of locking up for longer in order to reduce the risk of recidivism.

  5. Vinod:

    I remember something from Crim Law! “Specific deterrence” – by keeping a specific criminal incarcerated, he can not commit more crimes v. “general deterrence” – locking up a criminal will deter others from committing crimes.

    My issue was with the word “recidivism” because many who have been detained have never done anything wrong.

    Among known/proven/however you want to put it terrorists, I doubt the US will ever release them.

  6. Deepa

    I doubt the US will ever release them

    Actually, this administration has released many of them like Yaser Hamdi just recently.

    After keeping him locked up in a Navy brig for almost three years, the U.S. government seems to want Yaser Esam Hamdi to just go away. Hamdi, a Louisiana native, was captured in Afghanistan in Novermber 2001. His father says Hamdi, 22, who moved to Saudi Arabia with his family as a child, was doing relief work. U.S. authorities say he was fighting for the Taliban….“If the government’s view prevails, and it alone decides who is an enemy combatant, then there is nothing to stop it from declaring anyone – you, me or Tom Daschle – an enemy combatant, who can be detained indefinitely without trial,” wrote Columbia University law professor Michael Dorf before the Supreme Court announced the Hamdi decision….The Washington Post called the government’s decision to finally allow Hamdi to be released “an adroit backflip.” “If such an arrangement is now possible, why was it a matter of such grave national security concern to keep Mr. Hamdi from meeting with his lawyer for so long in the first place?” he asks an August 12 Washington Post editorial. Olshansky sees the likely provision against suing the U.S. government as proof that the length and conditions of Hamdi’s detention were unwarranted all along. “The conditions they want to put on his release are a tacit acknowledgement that he never should have been held,” she said. “They’re saying we know you can sue us for wrongful arrest and detention, but now instead of acknowledging what might have been an error and apologizing to the individual, they’re demanding he forfeit his rights to any kind of relief. This speaks of an administration that cares so little for humanity.”

    Woops, sorry about that Yaser! Just don’t sue us ok, buddy..

    In terms of recidivism who knows? I mean the justice department gathered several thousand men after 9/11 who appartently didn’t have any ties to terrorisism. And then tricked iranians in California. What would be the percentage of men that would consider joining terrorist groups from these incidents? Or from fall out’s like Abu Gharib?

  8. Interesting article Deepa. Here’s one that corroborates it’s some more.

    In early November 2001, with Americans still staggered by the Sept. 11 attacks, a small group of White House officials worked in great secrecy to devise a new system of justice for the new war they had declared on terrorism….
    ..Determined to deal aggressively with the terrorists they expected to capture, the officials bypassed the federal courts and their constitutional guarantees, giving the military the authority to detain foreign suspects indefinitely and prosecute them in tribunals not used since World War II..
    Many of them were members of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal fraternity. Some had clerked for Supreme Court justices, Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia in particular. A striking number had clerked for a prominent Reagan appointee, Lawrence H. Silberman of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.One young lawyer recalled looking around the room during a meeting with Attorney General John Ashcroft. “Of 10 people, 7 of us were former Silberman clerks,” he said.

  9. I don’t get it. How did the “officials” bypass federal law? I thought that we were at war

  10. Kill the detainees, who cares what people say, and laugh in there lawyers face if they want to sue, and rip up there paperwork.