The Pentagon has freshly updated and made available to the public a cartload of Military Commissions materials. Earlier this month we noted that the site hadn’t been updated for several months. That’s been remedied. On the site are:
- Rules of Practice for the Court of Military Commission and Review
- After a very quick perusal, I notice nothing too remarkable here–they look like, as we were led to suspect, a typical Court of Criminal Appeals’ rules, modified for the Commissions context. Many rules are footnoted “taken from ACCA (Army Court) rule” this or “Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces Rule” that. I will note that Rule 30 states that “The Clerk of Court is authorized to release unclassified filings with the CMCR and CMCR decisions. Filings and decisions will be available at: http://www.defenselink.mil/news/commissions.html.” That openness is certainly welcome, hopefully the link will be continually and timely updated.
- Admission to practice requirements (as if you’d want to): “to be eligible for admission to the Bar of the CMCR, an attorney must be a member in good standing of the Bar of the highest court of a state, territory, commonwealth, or possession of the United States, the District of Columbia, or of the Bar of a Federal Court.” Proof of good standing is required. Foreign attorneys may gain honorary membership.
- Approval and Promulgation of Rules of Practice
- Multiple recent documents from the Khadr Commissions case that AO has reported on, inter alia, HERE (Khadr and Hamdan dismissal), HERE (reconsideration denial), and HERE (Khadr appeal), including:
- the 6 June 07 Trial Judge’s dismissal for lack of jurisdiction
- Prosecution’s 8 June 07 reconsideration request
- Trial Judge’s 29 June 07 denial of reconsideration
- Prosecution’s 4 Jul 07 CMCR brief
- USCMCR’s 11 Jul 07 docketing order, case assignment, and briefing schedule
- Defense’s 11 Jul 07 delay request and admission request for Canadian counsel
- Prosecution’s 12 Jul 07 request of permission to file a brief
- USCMCR’s 13 Jul 07 admission of Canadian counsel and ordering a new briefing schedule
Lime out
