Biden administration temporarily blocks 9/11 guilty plea for Khalid Sheikh

Lawyers for the administration asked a federal appeals panel to halt the agreement, which was set to proceed Friday at the Guantanamo Bay military base in Cuba. Defence lawyers called this a continuation of two decades of mismanagement and delays in the case by US authorities.

The federal appeals panel granted a temporary stay late on Thursday, delaying the plea deal to allow for further review of the government’s request. The court made it clear the decision was not final but only a temporary measure.

The move comes after years of legal battles over the case, which remains in pretrial hearings 17 years after charges were first filed. The delays have been tied to legal disputes, including debates over whether evidence obtained through torture can be used in court.

The plea agreement, approved by military prosecutors and a senior Pentagon official earlier this year, would have spared Mohammed and two co-defendants the possibility of the death penalty. In exchange, they would answer questions from the families of 9/11 victims about the attacks.

However, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin announced in August that he opposed the deal. He argued that decisions regarding the death penalty in a case as significant as 9/11 should be made at the highest levels, saying the Pentagon’s leadership should not delegate such matters.

Defence attorneys for Mohammed argued that the agreement had already been finalised and that Austin had no legal authority to overturn it after approval. “This extraordinary intervention… is solely a product of his lack of oversight over his own duly appointed delegate,” the attorneys said, according to Associated Press (AP). 

Family members of 9/11 victims had already gathered at Guantanamo Bay in anticipation of the proceedings. If the hearing had gone ahead, Mohammed would have formally entered a guilty plea to 2,976 counts of murder, along with other charges.

Pleas by two co-defendants, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al Hawsawi, were scheduled for later in the month.

The Justice Department argued that accepting the guilty pleas would harm the US government by denying it the opportunity to pursue a full public trial.

It said a trial was essential to seeking the death penalty against those charged with “a heinous act of mass murder” that shocked the world, reported AP.

Military prosecutors had earlier informed victims’ families that the plea deal was “the best path to finality and justice.”

They cited the legal and logistical hurdles that have bogged down the case for years, preventing it from going to trial. As of now, the plea deal remains on hold, pending further legal proceedings.