Anonymous testimony {Israeli Agents} pushes limits
Defense lawyers say justice isn't served if they can't know the identities of the Israeli agents.
By Greg Krikorian, Times Staff Writer
December 26, 2006
In three current high-profile criminal cases, federal prosecutors have asked that the identities of Israeli government witnesses be withheld from defendants and their attorneys — a move some legal scholars see as a highly unusual end run around the 6th Amendment.
Defense attorneys in all three cases have argued, with mixed results, that allowing U.S. prosecutors to keep the witnesses' identities secret — as demanded by Israel to protect its agents — violates their clients' constitutional right to confront their accusers.
Though courts have allowed witnesses to testify in secured courtrooms or found other ways to protect their identities when they might be in danger, experts say it is extraordinary to keep the identities secret even from defense attorneys...
In Chicago, a federal judge recently permitted two Israeli agents to testify anonymously against two men accused of aiding the Palestinian group Hamas, designated by the U.S. as a terrorist organization since 1995. Judge Amy J. St. Eve said that the right to learn a witness' identity was "not absolute" and that the use of pseudonyms for the Israeli agents was justified because of their assignments...
Now a federal judge in Dallas, hearing the Bush administration's highest-profile prosecution of alleged terrorist financiers, is weighing a request to allow two Israeli security officials to testify anonymously in a courtroom closed to the public.
The Texas case involves seven former officials of the now-defunct Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, once the nation's largest Islamic charity, which was founded in Los Angeles and later based in Texas. The defendants, all but one a U.S. citizen, are charged with supporting terrorism by sending money to overseas charities that the U.S. and Israel contend are controlled by Hamas...
Justice Department officials declined to comment about the Texas case or others in which prosecutors had sought anonymity for Israeli witnesses. Defense attorneys in the Dallas case also declined to comment.
LinkHere
By Greg Krikorian, Times Staff Writer
December 26, 2006
In three current high-profile criminal cases, federal prosecutors have asked that the identities of Israeli government witnesses be withheld from defendants and their attorneys — a move some legal scholars see as a highly unusual end run around the 6th Amendment.
Defense attorneys in all three cases have argued, with mixed results, that allowing U.S. prosecutors to keep the witnesses' identities secret — as demanded by Israel to protect its agents — violates their clients' constitutional right to confront their accusers.
Though courts have allowed witnesses to testify in secured courtrooms or found other ways to protect their identities when they might be in danger, experts say it is extraordinary to keep the identities secret even from defense attorneys...
In Chicago, a federal judge recently permitted two Israeli agents to testify anonymously against two men accused of aiding the Palestinian group Hamas, designated by the U.S. as a terrorist organization since 1995. Judge Amy J. St. Eve said that the right to learn a witness' identity was "not absolute" and that the use of pseudonyms for the Israeli agents was justified because of their assignments...
Now a federal judge in Dallas, hearing the Bush administration's highest-profile prosecution of alleged terrorist financiers, is weighing a request to allow two Israeli security officials to testify anonymously in a courtroom closed to the public.
The Texas case involves seven former officials of the now-defunct Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, once the nation's largest Islamic charity, which was founded in Los Angeles and later based in Texas. The defendants, all but one a U.S. citizen, are charged with supporting terrorism by sending money to overseas charities that the U.S. and Israel contend are controlled by Hamas...
Justice Department officials declined to comment about the Texas case or others in which prosecutors had sought anonymity for Israeli witnesses. Defense attorneys in the Dallas case also declined to comment.
LinkHere
posted by Kangaroo Brisbane Australia at 5:44 PM
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