Judge: American to go to Iraq, his death MATT APUZZO
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - An American citizen facing a death sentence in Iraq lost a court challenge Thursday that would have prohibited the military from turning him over to Iraqi authorities.
Mohammad Munaf was convicted and sentenced to death by an Iraqi judge last week on charges he helped in the 2005 kidnapping of three Romanian journalists in Baghdad.
Munaf, who was born in Iraq and became an American citizen in 2000, sought an emergency order blocking U.S. military officials from turning him over to Iraq. He claimed his trial was flawed and his confession was coerced.
Those would normally be grounds for American citizens to challenge their imprisonment. But U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth said he had no authority to intervene because Munaf was being held by coalition military forces, not by the U.S. military alone.
That distinction, adopted by the U.S. government, is at the heart of an ongoing legal fight over the fate of American citizens being held in Iraq. Critics say it is disingenuous because the prisons Munaf and others are being held in are operated by the U.S. military.
"In time of actual hostilities or war, as in Iraq, courts should tread lightly and give the president, as commander in chief, the full power of his office," Lamberth wrote.
Munaf's attorneys wanted Lamberth to block the transfer at least temporarily, while a Washington appeals court considers the similar case of Shawqi Omar, an American citizen accused of being a top Al-Qaida lieutenant in Iraq.
Munaf can appeal the case and ask the same court considering Omar's case to block his transfer. Munaf's attorney, who also represents Omar, did not immediately return a message seeking comment.