NYT : Judge Throws Out Charges in Padilla Case

Judge Throws Out Charges in Padilla Case

By ERIC LICHTBLAU | August 22, 2006

WASHINGTON, Aug. 21 — A federal judge has ruled that the government brought overlapping and redundant charges against Jose Padilla, a former “enemy combatant” linked to Al Qaeda, and she dismissed one that could have resulted in a life sentence.

The judge, Marcia G. Cooke of Federal District Court in Miami, said constitutional problems were raised in the charges that Mr. Padilla and two co-defendants were in a conspiracy to support violent jihad campaigns overseas.

All three charges related to one conspiracy to support terrorism overseas, Judge Cooke said.

“Charging the defendants with a single offense multiple times is violative of the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment,” she wrote in a decision dated Friday and released on Monday.

Judge Cooke threw out a conspiracy charge that the men conspired to murder, kidnap and maim people in a foreign country.

Andrew Patel, a lawyer for Mr. Padilla, said the decision could ultimately mean the difference between Mr. Padilla’s facing a life sentence and a maximum of 20 years.

“This is cleaning up the indictment,” Mr. Patel said. “It’s procedural. This is a highly technical legal issue that doesn’t affect the trial at all. It may in a theoretical sense affect the maximum time” faced by Mr. Padilla.

Justice Department officials said they were considering an appeal. The United States attorney in Miami, R. Alexander Acosta, said in a statement, “We stand by the charges in this indictment and will respond after a full review of the court’s order.”

Mr. Padilla, a one-time gang member in Chicago who converted to Islam, was linked in 2002 to a reported plot to detonate a “dirty bomb” on American streets. He was declared an enemy combatant and held in a brig in South Carolina for three and a half years without being charged. The Justice Department, facing a deadline, decided in November to prosecute him in federal court on unrelated terrorism charges.