This was the murky world in which these interrogators operated. No jury in America would have convicted them at the time they were being investigated. Not even close. Mr. Holder’s decision, then, raises fundamental questions of fairness. Once the Justice Department declined to prosecute five years ago, the misconduct cases were sent back to the Central Intelligence Agency to handle. The agency decided to take internal disciplinary action. The employees and contractors in question — having been assured by their employer that they would no longer be facing prosecution — presumably accepted the administrative sanctions, relying on the Justice Department decision to end the criminal inquiry.
For the government now to turn around and prosecute them without any significant new facts coming to light would be, legal experts tell me, a violation of the principle of estoppel. To a nonlawyer, it sure seems wrong. And you can be sure that any decent defense lawyer is going to raise this issue if there is a trial — particularly if the government decides to use admissions that might have been made during the agency’s administrative hearings.
Why are Barack Obama and Eric Holder working so hard to destroy the capabilities of the CIA? While I don’t think all that highly of the CIA, it is a large part of what we have.
Joseph Finder makes some very interesting points in his New York Times Op-Ed. Read it all here. Still, it doesn’t explain why Obama and Holder are so intent on destroying America’s intelligence capabilities.
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