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Politics|Federal Court Halts Hearing on Eve of Guilty Plea by Accused 9/11 Mastermind
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/09/us/politics/911-khalid-shaikh-mohammed-plea-deal.html
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A three-judge appeals panel will decide whether the plea deal Khalid Shaikh Mohammed reached to avoid a death-penalty trial remains valid.
Jan. 9, 2025, 8:50 p.m. ET
A federal appeals court on Thursday temporarily halted a guilty plea hearing for the man accused of masterminding the Sept. 11 attacks while it considers whether the deal he reached to avoid a death-penalty trial remains valid.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued the order on the eve of a hearing at the U.S. military court at Guantánamo Bay in which a military judge was to question the accused plotter, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, about the settlement he reached this summer with military prosecutors.
The court will decide, during the next administration, whether Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III successfully withdrew from the settlement on Aug. 2, two days after the retired Army general he put in charge of the case signed it. Two lower, military courts ruled that he had acted too late.
The court also halted plea hearings, scheduled for later this month, that Mr. Austin had wanted stopped for Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, two men who were accused of conspiring with Mr. Mohammed in the attacks.
The back and forth over the settlement has caused anguish for relatives of the nearly 3,000 people killed in the attacks — both those who want a full trial, no matter how long it takes, and those who have accepted the settlement as the only sure path to a conviction that cannot be appealed.
At Guantánamo Bay, relatives who were brought by prosecutors for a weeklong visit to watch the proceedings reacted emotionally.
