I make my living as a police sergeant working for a municipal police department. In my formal education as a sworn law enforcement officer, one of the first things I learned about was the Posse Comitatus Act, which generally prohibits federal military forces from being used to enforce civilian criminal law. Like many protections of law, this Act protects us as citizens from the tyrannical overreach of the federal government.
As enemy Jihadists captured on the battlefield by members of the US military are brought onto US soil to be jailed in federal prisons and tried for “criminal acts” in civilian criminal courts, has anyone considered whether this is a blatant violation of the Posse Comitatus Act? While there are several exceptions to the prohibitions of Posse Comitatus, none of them appear to be applicable to the circumstances surrounding the military capture and civilian prosecution of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the rest of the enemy combatants detained at Guantanamo. You have to ask whether those in power making these decisions are ignorant to the principles of Liberty and protections under the rule of law…or “crazy like a fox” as they continue to erode our Liberty and the protections the rule of law provides against the rule of men.
November 21st, 2009 at 9:56 AM
I still don’t understand if K.S.M. is to be tried in a U.S. court why you would not prosecute him for the Pentagon attack