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Joe Conason: Zazi Terror Case Vindicates Justice
Before Najibullah Zazi is finally dispatched to a secure cell block for good, it’s important to remember how the taxi driver turned terrorist was brought to justice — and why the critics who jeered his civilian prosecution were dead wrong.
By convicting Zazi and pursuing the leads that his capture and interrogation have provided, the FBI has shown that traditional U.S. methods — rather than the “enhanced interrogation” and military tribunals favored by the right — are highly effective instruments of national security.
The FBI takedown of Zazi’s planned “martyrdom operation” began soon after police stopped him on his way into New York City last September. Using lawfully authorized search-and-surveillance techniques, agents quickly established that he was putting together the components for the same kind of explosive — known as TATP — that had been used in the London subway bombings. The al-Qaeda conspiracy to attack the New York subways, with the hapless Zazi as a suicide bomber, was extinguished.
After his arrest, Zazi obtained counsel and, like many criminal defendants, seemed to be preparing to go to trial. Then came the drumbeat of criticism from the right, led by former officials of the Bush administration. Former White House press secretary Dana Perino declared in the National Review that the Zazi case provided a “cautionary tale” because the surveillance had been aborted, the case blown and the investigation ended “prematurely.”
According to Perino, the suspect had lawyered up and “stopped talking.” Without applying instruments of torture, she worried, “any further cooperation Zazi may provide is up to him and his lawyer.” If only the Obama administration had declared Zazi to be an “enemy combatant” and applied “so-called enhanced interrogation techniques” to him, the results would have been far better.
The same complaints were heard, predictably, from former prosecutor Andrew McCarthy, another frequent commentator in the right-wing media, who charged that the FBI and the New York City Police Department had somehow botched the Zazi probe. As of last fall, such critics were predicting that the case would conclude with minor charges against the defendants, including Zazi — and a lost opportunity to pursue important investigative leads against al-Qaeda operatives both here and abroad.
The mistakes were made not by the FBI, however, but by its critics, whose dire predictions turned out to be entirely erroneous. Not only did Zazi plead guilty this week and detail the entire conspiracy in his confession, but he and at least one of his uncles, indicted in a separate sealed proceeding, are evidently cooperating in what Attorney General Eric Holder has described as an “ongoing investigation.”
A hint of the contours of that investigation could be found in the Justice Department’s summary of the case against Zazi. It explains that although he had traveled to Pakistan with the intention of joining the Taliban, he was “recruited by al-Qaeda” shortly after arriving there and taken to Waziristan for terrorist training. His indictment for conspiracy to commit murder in a foreign country suggests that Zazi is talking about the individuals who trained and indoctrinated him and the places where that occurred.
Not surprisingly, the same caustic critics who tried to use the Zazi case to demand tribunals and torture instead of constitutional justice are paying scant attention to the outcome. But the attorney general spoke out clearly and convincingly about the broader meaning of this case when the defendant entered his plea:
“This demonstrates that our federal civilian criminal justice system ... is a powerful tool in our fight against terrorism. ... We have to couple it with what we do on the military side, what we do on the intelligence-gathering side. But to take this tool out of our hands, to denigrate the use of this tool, flies in the face of the facts.”
As U.S. and Pakistani agents apprehend Taliban officials, and as the Justice Department uses lawful means to induce one terror suspect after another to cooperate, those facts ought to matter to anyone who cares about defeating al-Qaeda — rather than scoring cheap shots against the Constitution.
— Joe Conason writes for the New York Observer. Click here for more information, or click here to contact him.
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» on 02.26.10 @ 01:25 PM
Isn’t it interesting that many of the same national and Washington political voices who opine on the dangers of run-away or too-big federal government on issues like health reform seem so complacent about a Big Brother approach toward law, justice, and the Constitution we got from our Founders, when it comes to national security?
Our everyday “criminal justice system” has worked just fine trying mass murderers, serial killers, violent international drug lords.
But we hear that when it comes to Iraq, Afghanistan, al Qaeda, we’re just too weak or vulnerable to show these rascals that they can face justice without secret military tribunals or indefinite suspension of habeas corpus. Why?
If America is so weak that we’re afraid the system that has nurtured and
sustained us since 1776 cannot work to deal with our mostly lame 3rd world
enemies, then our issues are much, much deeper than who stands public trial
in New York, and who languishes at Gitmo (forever).
Barry Goldwater used to say that, “Any government big enough to give us
everything we want, is also big enough to take away everything we have.” Yes.
I’d rather chance another al Qaeda demonstration here, than turn America into
some Kafka-Orwell shadow nightmare of law and justice.
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» on 02.26.10 @ 02:29 PM
Sorry Joe but you are wrong and so are you Publius. It has nothing to do with how robust our justice system is. It has everything to do with who gets that system and who doesn’t. Non-citizens do not get it. Citizens do. It may get murky when it comes to international criminals but when it comes to terrorists, caught on the battlefield on foreign soil its crystal clear, they have no rights under our constitution. That is the issue period and I don’t really care what any ideologs from either party say. If you want American justice you must be an American citizen, period. Joe and his merry band of liberals can argue their one world government point of view all they want. They may even be right ideologically. But in the real practical world you boys are dead wrong and even deadly wrong. Quit this infantile, pie in the sky crap when it comes to terrorism before you get more of us killed. It’s that simple and many of us from both sides of the isle have a really low tolerance for you meddling in ideological ways with our national safety. Knock it off.
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