Al Maqaleh v. Gates

• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Columbia
• Writing for the Court: John D. Bates
• Citation: Al Maqaleh v. Gates, 604 F.Supp.2d 205 (D. D.C. 2009)
• Decision Date: 02 April 2009
• Docket Number: Civil Action No. 08-2143.,Civil Action No. 06-1669.,Civil Action No. 08-1307.,Civil Action No. 06-1697.
• Parties: Fadi AL MAQALEH, et al., Petitioners, v. Robert GATES, et al., Respondents. Haji Wazir, et al., Petitioners, v. Robert Gates, et al., Respondents. Amin Al Bakri, et al., Petitioners, v. Barack H. Obama, et al., Respondents. Redha Al-Najar, et al., Petitioners, v. Robert Gates, et al., Respondents.

Page 205

604 F.Supp.2d 205

Fadi AL MAQALEH, et al., Petitioners, v. Robert GATES, et al., Respondents.

Haji Wazir, et al., Petitioners, v. Robert Gates, et al., Respondents.

Amin Al Bakri, et al., Petitioners, v. Barack H. Obama, et al., Respondents.

Redha Al-Najar, et al., Petitioners, v. Robert Gates, et al., Respondents.

Civil Action No. 06-1669.

Civil Action No. 06-1697.

Civil Action No. 08-1307.

Civil Action No. 08-2143.

United States District Court, District of Columbia.

April 2, 2009.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Tina Monshipour Foster, International Justice Network, Bayside, NY, Barbara J. Olshansky, Kathleen A. Kelly, Stanford University Law School, Stanford, CA, for Petitioners.

Jean Lin, John Caviness O'Quinn, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for Respondents.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

JOHN D. BATES, District Judge.

Before the Court are respondents' motions to dismiss these four petitions for habeas corpus. The petitioners are all foreign nationals captured outside Afghanistan yet held at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan for six years or more. The issue at the heart of these cases is whether these petitioners may, in the wake of Boumediene v. Bush, ___ U.S. ___, 128 S.Ct. 2229, 171 L.Ed.2d 41 (2008), invoke the Suspension Clause of the Constitution, Art I. § 9 cl. 2. If so, then section 7(a) of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 ("MCA"), Pub.L. No. 109-366, 120 Stat. 2600, is unconstitutional as applied to these petitioners and they are entitled to seek the protection of the writ of habeas corpus. But if not, then these petitions must be dismissed as respondents have urged.

The issues here closely parallel those in Boumediene, in large part because the detainees themselves as well as the rationale for detention are essentially the same. The case calls for the first application of the multi-factor functional test crafted by the Supreme Court in Boumediene, and the same vital jurisprudential concerns at play there also frame the analysis here.

It must be remembered, then, that the writ of habeas corpus plays a central role in our constitutional system as conceived by the Framers, which "must inform proper interpretation of the Suspension Clause." Boumediene, 128 S.Ct. at 2244. Indeed, "the Framers deemed the writ to be an essential mechanism in the separation-of-powers scheme," id. at 2246, that, as Alexander Hamilton observed, was vital to the protection of individuals against the very same arbitrary exercise of the government's power to detain that is alleged by petitioners here:

"[C]onfinement of the person, by secretly hurrying him to jail, where his sufferings are unknown or forgotten, is a less public, a less striking, and therefore a more dangerous engine of arbitrary government." And as a remedy for this fatal evil [Blackstone] is everywhere peculiarly emphatical in his encomiums on the habeas corpus act, which in one place he calls "the bulwark of the British Constitution."

Boumediene, 128 S.Ct. at 2247 (quoting The Federalist No. 84, at 512 (Alexander Hamilton) (C. Rossiter ed., 1961) (quoting 1 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *136)) (emphasis in original).

So, too, the Suspension Clause was forged to guard against such Executive abuses, by protecting those detained through the assurance, except in the strictly-confined periods of suspension, that "the Judiciary will have a time-tested device, the writ, to maintain the `delicate balance of governance' that is itself the surest safeguard of liberty." Boumediene, 128 S.Ct. at 2247 (quoting Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507, 536, 124 S.Ct. 2633, 159 L.Ed.2d 578 (2004) (plurality opinion)). Hence, "[t]he separation-of-powers doctrine . . . must inform the reach and purpose of the Suspension Clause." Id. But that principle requires, as well, that the Judiciary accord proper deference to the political branches, particularly during conflicts abroad where the Executive must retain "substantial authority to apprehend and detain those who pose a real danger to our security." Id. at 2277. In the end, though, while "the Executive's powers as Commander in Chief" must be preserved, the courts still must fulfill their responsibility to review, with appropriate caution, the exercise of those powers:

Within the Constitution's separation-of-powers structure, few exercises of judicial power are as legitimate or as necessary as the responsibility to hear challenges to the authority of the Executive to imprison a person. Some of these petitioners have been in custody for six years with no definitive judicial determination as to the legality of their detention. Their access to the writ is a necessity to determine the lawfulness of their status, even if, in the end, they do not obtain the relief they seek.

Id.

This Court's role, and this decision, is nonetheless quite narrow, and is limited today to assessing whether the Suspension Clause extends to these four petitioners and hence whether they are entitled to seek habeas corpus in this Court. Applying the Boumediene factors carefully, the Court concludes that these petitioners are virtually identical to the detainees in Boumediene—they are non-citizens who were (as alleged here) apprehended in foreign lands far from the United States and brought to yet another country for detention. And as in Boumediene, these petitioners have been determined to be "enemy combatants," a status they contest. Moreover, the process used to make that determination is inadequate and, indeed significantly less than the Guantanamo detainees in Boumediene received. Although the site of detention at Bagram is not identical to that at Guantanamo Bay, the "objective degree of control" asserted by the United States there is not appreciably different than at Guantanamo. Finally, it cannot be denied that the "practical obstacles" inherent in resolving a Bagram detainee's entitlement to habeas corpus are in some ways greater than those present for a Guantanamo detainee, because Bagram is located in an active theater of war. But those obstacles are not as great as respondents claim, and certainly are not insurmountable. And importantly, for these petitioners, such practical barriers are largely of the Executive's choosing— they were all apprehended elsewhere and then brought (i.e., rendered) to Bagram for detention now exceeding six years.

Based on those conclusions driven by application of the Boumediene test, the Court concludes that the Suspension Clause extends to, and hence habeas corpus review is available to, three of the four petitioners. As to the fourth, his Afghan citizenship—given the unique "practical obstacles" in the form of friction with the "host" country—is enough to tip the balance of the Boumediene factors against his claim to habeas corpus review. When a Bagram detainee has either been apprehended in Afghanistan or is a citizen of that country, the balance of factors may change. Although it may seem odd that different conclusions can be reached for different detainees at Bagram, in this Court's view that is the predictable outcome of the functional, multi-factor, detainee-by-detainee test the Supreme Court has mandated in Boumediene.

BACKGROUND

All four petitioners in these cases have been detained as "enemy combatants" by the United States at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan ("Bagram"). All four claim to have been captured outside Afghanistan and contest their designation as enemy combatants.¹ Fadi al Maqaleh, a Yemeni citizen who was taken into U.S. custody sometime in 2003, filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus on September 28, 2006. Maqaleh Am. Habeas Pet. ¶¶ 11, 14. He claims that he was captured beyond Afghan borders but does not specify where. Id. ¶¶ 24-25. Haji Wazir, an Afghan citizen, filed a habeas petition on September 29, 2006.² Wazir Habeas Pet. ¶ 2. Wazir was captured in Dubai, United Arab Emirates in 2002 and has been in U.S. custody since. See Declaration of Jawed Ahmad ¶ 31 (attached as Exhibit 1 to Wazir Opp'n to Resps.' Mot. to Dismiss ("Wazir Opp'n")). Amin al Bakri is a Yemeni citizen, captured by U.S. forces in Thailand in 2002, who filed a petition seeking habeas review on July 28, 2008. Bakri Habeas Pet. ¶¶ 2-3. Redha al-Najar filed a habeas petition on December 10, 2008. Al-Najar is a citizen of Tunisia who was captured in Pakistan in 2002. Al-Najar Habeas Pet. ¶¶ 12, 25.

Respondents dispute some of the facts alleged in the habeas petitions. Although respondents do not contest any petitioner's claim as to his country of citizenship, they do take issue with some petitioners' statements as to the place of their capture. For example, respondents contest al Maqaleh's claim that he was captured outside Afghanistan. See Declaration of Charles A. Tennison ¶ 20 (attached as Exhibit 1 to Resps.' Mot. to Dismiss al Maqaleh's Habeas Pet. ("Resps.' Maqaleh Mot.")).

After al Maqaleh and Wazir filed their habeas petitions, but before al Bakri and al-Najar filed their petitions, the Supreme Court decided Boumediene v. Bush, ___ U.S. ___, 128 S.Ct. 2229, 171 L.Ed.2d 41 (2008).³ In that case, the Supreme Court considered habeas petitions filed by "aliens designated as enemy combatants and detained at the United States Naval Station at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba." Id. at 2240. The Court first determined that section 7 of the MCA "deprives the federal courts of jurisdiction to entertain the habeas corpus actions now before us." Id. at 2242-44. The Court then examined "whether [petitioners] have the constitutional privilege of habeas corpus, a privilege not to be withdrawn except in conformance with the Suspension Clause." Id. at 2240. In a lengthy five-to-four opinion, the Supreme Court first determined that the Suspension Clause of the Constitution has "full effect" at Guantanamo Bay and detainees at Guantanamo "are entitled to the privilege of habeas corpus to challenge the legality of their detention." Id. at 2262....