WASHINGTON - November 5 - A group of prominent legal and national security experts is urging members of the Senate to defeat an effort to block Justice Department funding for the prosecution of suspected 9-11 terrorist within the U.S and is available for interview. Today, Senator Lindsey Graham is expected to propose such an amendment as the Senate considers the Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations bill. The measure could derail any Obama Administration plan to try some Guantanamo detainees - including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed - in U.S. federal courts.  

Each of the prominent Americans below has signed a bipartisan declaration (Beyond Guantanamo, available below) that backs a single scheme for the disposition of cases of current and future detainees. The declaration sets forth principles for dealing with present and future terrorists detainees upon the closing of Guantanamo:

  ·  Indefinite detention without charge should be rejected because it will result in protracted litigation and delayed justice, weaken our alliance, and undermine constitutional principles at home; and

• Terrorism suspects should be tried in federal courts.

Stephen Abraham

Stephen Abraham is a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army. He was the first officer to publicly criticize the Combatant Status Review Tribunals at Guantanamo, filing an affidavit before the U.S. Supreme Court in the detainee habeas case Boumediene v. Bush.  

Former Congressman Bob Barr

Bob Barr was the United States attorney for the Northern District of Georgia from 1986 to 1990 and served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003 as a member of the Judiciary Committee.  

Rear Admiral John D. Hutson, JAGC, USN (Ret.)

Rear Admiral John D. Hutson served in the U. S. Navy from 1973 to 2000. He was the Navy's Judge Advocate General from 1997 to 2000. Admiral Hutson now serves as President and Dean of the Franklin Pierce Law Center in Concord, New Hampshire. He also joined Human Rights First's Board of Directors in 2005.  

Major General William L. Nash, USA (Ret.)

General Nash served in the Army for 34 years and is a veteran of Vietnam and Operation Desert Storm. He has extensive experience in peacekeeping operations, both as a military commander in Bosnia-Herzegovina (1995-1996) and as a civilian administrator for the United Nations in Kosovo (2000).  Since his retirement in 1998, General Nash has been a Fellow and Visiting Lecturer at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government (1998), and Director of Civil-Military Programs at the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (1999-2000), and a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (2001-2009).   He is also a professorial lecturer at Georgetown University, a visiting lecturer at Princeton University, and a military consultant for ABC News.

  Richard A. Rossman

Chief of Staff, Criminal Division, U.S. Department of Justice, 1998-1999; U.S. Attorney, Eastern District of Michigan, 1980-1981; Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney, Eastern District of Michigan, 1977-1980; Chief Deputy Federal Defender, Eastern District of Michigan, 1972-1975  

  Beyond Guantanamo: A Bipartisan Declaration - Background Materials

To view the Declaration, go to:

http://www.constitutionproject.org/manage/file/347.pdf  

For the list of signatories to the Declaration, go to:

http://www.constitutionproject.org/manage/file/348.pdf     

For additional materials, visit:

www.constitutionproject.org