Federal Judge Thomas B. Russell Rules Bowling Green, Kentucky, Iraqi Al-Qaeda Suspect, Waad Ramadan Alwan, Can Be Tried In Civilian Court.

Iraqi can be tried in civilian court: Judge issues ruling in bombing case
Written by Andrew Wolfson

An Iraqi national charged in Kentucky with planting roadside bombs in Iraq can be tried in civilian court, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.

U.S. District Judge Thomas B. Russell rejected Waad Ramadan Alwan’s claims that, under the Geneva Convention, he could only be prosecuted in Iraq.

Alwan was indicted in Bowling Green on charges that he engaged in conspiracy to commit the murder of U.S. nationals in Iraq during the insurgency there between 2003 and 2006.

He and Mohanad Shareef Hammadi were arrested in Kentucky in May and also charged with conspiring to send weapons and cash to al-Qaida in Iraq. Both have pleaded not guilty and are being detained pending trial, which has not been set.

Alwan’s lawyer, chief federal public defender Scott Wendelsdorf, sought dismissal of the murder charges on the grounds that the international treaty signed by the United States says that civilians in Iraq were subject to prosecution only under local law or through military tribunals.

Wendelsdorf also claimed that the federal statute that Alwan was charged with violating was intended only to protect diplomatic personnel overseas, not troops in nations under military occupation.

But Russell agreed with the prosecution that the law applies in areas under military control and covers the murder of any American abroad.

He also said that the Geneva Civilian Convention does not bar concurrent jurisdiction by foreign and U.S. courts, and that the federal law “may be extended to criminalize insurgent and terrorist activities in other countries even though those same acts may be punishable in Iraqi courts as well.”

The Justice Department and Wendelsdorf both declined to comment on the ruling.

Alwan is one of only a handful of foreign nationals to be prosecuted in the United States for alleged terrorism offenses in a U.S.-occupied territory such as Iraq or Afghanistan during wartime, the Justice Department has said.

U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell and others also have objected to the trial of Alwan and Hammadi in federal court, but they have cited security concerns and said they should be prosecuted before a military tribunal at Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba.

McConnell and others also have said the defendants don’t deserve the full protection of the Bill of Rights accorded to civilian defendants.

Alwan and Hammadi entered the United States after receiving refugee status.