The Khadr case took a somewhat unexpected turn today when the US military judge hearing the case ordered fuller and better disclosure. One of the risks of an independent judiciary is that the judges will act independently... .
The judge ruled that correspondence between the US and Canadian government officials regarding Guantanamo detainee Omar Khadr must be turned over to Khadr's defense team.
Prosecutors argued that they had found no such correspondence in US State Department records, but military judge Army Colonel Peter Brownback ordered that they conduct another search.
The defense made over a dozen discovery motions on Thursday, including requests for statements made by Khadr shortly after his initial 2002 arrest and the deposition of a military officer who wrote two reports on the skirmish in which Khadr was captured. Brownback is expected to rule on some of the motions tomorrow.
Khadr, now 21, faces life imprisonment after allegedly throwing a grenade that killed one US soldier and wounded another while fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2002. He was charged in April 2007 with murder, attempted murder, conspiracy and providing material support for terrorism, as well as spying.
James Morton
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