- Scepticism about the strength of the case against John
Walker, the so-called American Taliban fighter, is growing, but few legal
analysts expect him to escape a long prison sentence.
-
- The odds are not in his favour. The court in Virginia
that will hear the case is nicknamed the 'rocket docket' after its habit
of delivering guilty verdicts in record time. The defence case will begin
in a highly charged atmosphere on the anniversary of the terrorist attacks
on New York. The prosecution has been accused of misrepresenting a central
plank of its case, while a 'confession' obtained by the FBI was not written
by Walker, nor was it taped.
-
- The journalist who conducted the first interview with
Walker, 20, after he had been captured in Afghanistan said yesterday he
had grave worries about the way his work had been used by the government
lawyers.
-
- Robert Pelton, whose interview with John Walker on CNN
last December is one of the main strands of the prosecution case, told
The Observer of his concerns.
-
- He said there were a number of instances where the script
accompanying the Walker film had been presented by prosecution lawyers
as comments made directly by the accused. This made Walker appear more
knowledgeable about the al-Qaeda terrorist network and the war in
Afghanistan
than he really was.
-
- 'These were words that I was writing to narrate a report
with,' Pelton said. 'I am making assumptions because I know exactly what
Walker did and where he came from, but at the same time let's say I'm a
good journalist and I get my facts right. There are plenty of bad
journalists
out there - and if it becomes a precedent that the FBI uses television
reports to convict people, God help us all.'
-
- Pelton said it was important that the line between
journalism
and the US government's pursuit of its war aims should not be
blurred.
-
- 'One of the things that makes America so unique is that
we have these very rigid protections of the media and how we gather
information,'
Pelton added. 'The rules are being rewritten in terms of how we handle
prisoners, how we fight wars. Now we see the same thing happening with
the media. How the media is covering the war is now being used to prosecute
the war, and that bothers me.'
-
- His remarks came as it emerged that the FBI agents who
obtained Walker's alleged confession may have broken the agency's rules
by failing to get his statement either on tape or in writing. The only
record of the two-day interrogation is a summary written afterwards by
one of the agents who carried it out.
-
- Gregory Wallance, a former federal prosecutor based in
New York, said last night the defence was unlikely to put Walker on the
stand but would try to argue this 'confession' was obtained under duress
and was inadmissible.
-
- 'Everything turns on this confession. If that is thrown
out, it seems to me there is very little proof against this guy. The
government's biggest problem is that in order to make their main charges
stick they will have to prove that Walker was actively supporting the
al-Qaeda
terrorist network in some form, not simply that he was a member of the
Taliban who was fighting against the Northern Alliance,' Wallance
said.
-
- The only other significant evidence presented by the
prosecution is a series of emails sent by Walker to his mother in northern
California while he was travelling in Central Asia, in which he questioned
why she wanted to live in the US because, he wrote, 'what has America done
for anybody?' He told her that she should move to England.
-
- One legal source said last night: 'This is very weak
stuff indeed. As far as I am aware, there is no law in this country which
says you can't tell your mother she should go and live in England.'
-
- Walker is due to stand trial on 10 charges of supporting
and aiding terrorists, three of which carry a life sentence. The case will
be heard at the federal court in the eastern district of Virginia, which
has a reputation within legal circles as being a 'prosecutor's court',
partly because the jury pool is drawn from a community of retired military
veterans, Pentagon employees and federal workers - a group which is usually
hardline on law and order issues.
-
- The trial is due to start on 26 August, with the
prosecution
case expected to last two weeks. The defence would start its case on or
around 11 September.
-
- 'The government is attempting to make the connection
between this trial and the attacks,' said defence lawyer George Harris.
'For us to be in trial at that time is prejudicial to the
defendant.'
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2002
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- http://www.observer.co.uk
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