The Pentagon is appealing the judge’s decision that would allow 9/11 terrorists to avoid the death penalty

The US Defense Department is challenging a military judge’s decision to reinstate agreements with three September 11 terrorists that guarantee they will be spared the death penalty.

The Pentagon promised in a November 8 letter to the victims’ families that it would work to delay the guilt hearings.

The announcement followed months of back and forth between the Defense Ministry, the Office of Military Commissions (OMC) and lawyers for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed – the accused architect of the al-Qaeda attacks – and two alleged co-conspirators, Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin Attash and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi.

All three men have been held in a US military prison on the coast of Cuba since 2003.

Their lawyers’ deal with prosecutors sparked outrage on July 31 when military prosecutors confirmed that they had reached pre-trial agreements with the terrorists in which they would plead guilty to their involvement in the attacks in exchange for taking the death penalty off the table were.

The decision angered the victims’ family members, who had been eagerly awaiting justice for nearly a quarter century. Many said the death penalty was the only just outcome for the perpetrators of the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil in history.

On August 2, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced that he was withdrawing from the agreements.

The move gave the families a glimmer of hope that justice would be served as they imagined, but on November 6, a military judge ruled that Austin did not have the authority to terminate the plea agreements, which he said were “valid and enforceable.” “stayed.

In rejecting Austin’s sentence, the judge granted the motions for guilty pleas and wrote that subsequent hearings would be announced at a later date.

Now the Pentagon is fighting the ruling.

“The government intends to request postponement of all plea hearings and appeal the commission’s decision before the U.S. military tribunal,” the Defense Department wrote in its letter.