After a military commission announced plans to give a plea deal to the mastermind of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, the Department of Defense announced the cancellation of the plea deal. The defendant, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and two accused accomplices, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, were set to have the death penalty taken off the table in the plea deal.
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Excerpt from AP
Defense secretary overrides plea agreement for accused 9/11 mastermind and two other defendants
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday overrode a plea agreement reached earlier this week for the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and two other defendants, reinstating them as death-penalty cases.
The move comes two days after the military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, announced that the official appointed to oversee the war court, retired Brig. Gen. Susan Escallier, had approved plea deals with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and two accused accomplices, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, in the attacks.
Letters sent to families of the nearly 3,000 people killed in the al-Qaida attacks said the plea agreement stipulated the three would serve life sentences at most.
Austin wrote in an order released Friday night that “in light of the significance of the decision,” he had decided that the authority to make a decision on accepting the plea agreements was his. He nullified Escallier’s approval.
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