Appeals court upholds plea deals for 9/11 Gitmo terrorists allowing them to skirt death penalty

A Pentagon appeals court upheld plea deals for three suspected Sept. 11 terrorists that would allow them to skirt the death penalty, according to The New York Times.

The three men detained at Guantanamo Bay, including alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, were granted plea deals over the summer that would allow them to avoid execution in exchange for pleading guilty to war crimes charges, according to the NYT. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin attempted in August to nix the plea deals — known officially as pre-trial agreements (PTA) — before a military judge ruled he acted too late in doing so; a three-judge appellate panel backed that ruling in a Monday decision.

“We agree with the military judge that the secretary did not have authority to revoke respondents’ existing PTAs because the respondents had started performance of the PTAs,” the judges wrote in their ruling, according to the NYT.

9/11 victims’ families sound off on the Biden admin’s Friday night decision to revoke the plea deal with KSM and his fellow terrorists:

“I can’t understand why we would ever be negotiating with terrorists.”

Read the latest from @realnickpope https://t.co/SuYVcIvguB

— Mike Bastasch (@MikeBastasch) August 3, 2024

Many family members of 9/11 victims are strongly opposed to the plea deals, believing that Mohammed and the other two suspected terrorists — Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al Hawsawi — should be put to death for their roles in the worst terrorist attacks in U.S. history, though there are also a number of other surviving family members that favor the PTAs. Notably, the Biden White House has tried to distance itself from the deals.

Mohammed is suspected of masterminding the attacks that murdered nearly 3,000 Americans, while bin Attash is accused of training two 9/11 hijackers, researching flight timetables to facilitate the attacks, and testing to see if passengers can successfully hide a knife on board an aircraft, according to the NYT. Al Hawaswi stands accused of providing logistical and financial support to some of the 9/11 hijackers.

Monday’s ruling is not the end of the road, as prosecutors must now eventually decide if they want to appeal against the deals in a higher court, with Austin’s August intervention also triggering more litigation, according to the NYT.

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