The decision by the US Secretary of Defense came on Friday, two days after the announcement of the Guantanamo Bay military commission.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday rescinded a plea deal reached earlier this week for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, accused of masterminding the September 11, 2001 attacks, and two other defendants.
The move comes two days after the military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, announced that the official appointed to oversee the war tribunal, retired Brig. Gen. Susan Escallier, had approved plea deals with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi.
Letters sent to the families of the nearly 3,000 people killed in the al-Qaeda attacks said the deal called for the three defendants to receive a maximum sentence of life in prison, avoiding a possible death sentence.
Judge Austin said Friday night that “given the importance of the decision”he had ruled that he was empowered to make a decision on whether to accept the plea deals. And rescinded Susan Escallier’s approval.
Some families of the attack victims had condemned the deal for cutting off any chance of a proper trial and possible death sentences. Republicans were quick to blame the Biden administration for the deal, though the White House said after it was announced that it was unaware of it.
The U.S. military commission overseeing the cases of the five defendants in the 9/11 attacks has been tied up in pretrial hearings and other preliminary legal proceedings since 2008. The torture the defendants suffered while in CIA custody is one of the obstacles slowing the progress of the cases and making the prospects for trials and verdicts uncertain, in part because evidence related to torture is inadmissible.
