I know that the justice system can often be slow and evidence and other factors can delay it but he was arrested 21 years ago and they’ve just reached a plea deal that just says they won’t execute him. How or what can make any trial take this long? How can a trial not be thrown out for taking so long? The evidence against him is incredible and far, far more than most people who do get executed so how any trial can take this long.
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In general it’s in the defenses best interest to delay the trial as long as possible and if the defendant is in custody there really isn’t a reason for the prosecution to rush it either especially if w/o trial they sit in jail and with one and if they’re found guilty they sit in jail. This means that from the perspective of the prosecution they’ve already put them behind bars. With someone like him they’ll also be trying to negotiate any additional information they can get out of him while still trying to promise them some sort of reduced punishment. These sorts of negotiations take time and information has to be validated for accuracy which also takes time and nobody is in a hurry to push it.
The latest season of serial talked about this. IIRC the crux of it is that the ideal situation is a plea deal because the fact that torture was involved works in favor of the defendants. The prosecutors don’t want to go to trial due to the potential impact torture would have on getting a conviction but the politicians raise a stink any time a “plea deal” is put on the table (even though quite a few victims’ families seem to be on board in order to get closure/justice of some kind).
The case had a very strong political element to it.
He was being tried in a US military tribunal appointed by the Bush administration. When Obama was elected, he replaced the entire Bush era panel of judges who were hearing the case and the new judges focused on his allegations that he had been tortured both by and on behalf of the US. The Obama appointed military judges used these allegations to just keep discovery open indefinitely and avoid setting a trial.
This continued until Trump, who removed all of the Obama era judges and replaced them with new judges. It took the new judges about 2 years to undo everything the Obama era judges did, with a trial ultimately being set to begin in 2020.
Biden took office right before the trial was supposed to start. He removed all of the Trump era judges and replaced them with judges who cancelled the trial, citing COVID as the reason for the cancellation. After COVID was over, the Biden administration offered him the current plea deal, which would avoid the death penalty, and used negotiations over that deal as a basis to avoid setting the trial.
This is not something that could ordinarily happen in a civilian court where the president can’t just fire the judges at will like they can in a military court.
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