DEBRA BURLINGAME
Slams court “jihad.”
JIM RICHES
“What’s going on here?”
GRIEVING: Lee and Eunice Hanson, yesterday at Fort Hamilton, lost family on 9/11. (
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It’s their only chance for justice, but victims’ relatives called the trial of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his cohorts a mockery and courtroom “jihad.”
About 50 family members watched the hearing from Fort Hamilton, Brooklyn — looking on in horror as the accused killer refused to participate and his co-conspirators disrupted the court with outbursts of shouting and prayer.
“They are engaging in jihad in the courtroom,” said Debra Burlingame, 58, of Ulster County, whose brother, Charles, piloted American Airlines Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon. “This is all sort of a theater for the defendants, and their attorneys are the ones who are enabling that to happen.
“My brother was murdered in the cockpit of his airplane, and we will have to stand up for him.”
Burlingame was furious when a defense lawyer, dressed in Arab garb, requested that women in the prosecution team dress appropriately.
Jim Riches, 60, of Brooklyn, a retired FDNY deputy chief who lost his firefighter son, Jimmy, at the World Trade Center, said the trial was “becoming a debacle” and “a joke.”
“The other family members [watching] are a bit destroyed,” he said. “You can hear them inside saying: ‘Are they kidding?’ ‘What’s going on here?’ ”
The survivors seethed when a defense lawyer said Mohammed refused to wear earphones that translated the proceedings because he had been tortured.
“If I wasn’t sitting down, I would have fallen down,” said Robert Reeg, 59, of Stony Point, a retired firefighter with Engine 44, on the Upper East Side. “It’s just beyond outrageous.
“At one point, the defense attorney says, ‘With all that Mr. Mohammed has been through,’ ” Reeg said. “What he’s been through? You should have seen what the people who had to jump from 100 stories up had to go through.”
Lee Hanson, 79, and his wife, Eunice, came from Connecticut to watch the arraignment hearing because “justice has been denied for so long,” he said.
“They praise Allah. I say, ‘Damn you!’ ” he added.
The couple lost their son, Peter, his wife, Sue, and their 2-year-old baby, Christine, on United Airlines Flight 175.
“I lost half my family — my only son — at the hands of the terrorists,” said Eunice Hanson. “And it’s just unconscionable that they’ve delayed [the trial] the way they have.”
The Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, hearing was also broadcast at Fort Devens in Massachusetts, Joint Base McGuire Dix in New Jersey and Fort Meade in Maryland — the only site open to the public.
Six victims’ families, chosen by lottery, traveled to Guantanamo to see the trial in person.
Jay Burke, 72, of Queens, left Fort Hamilton before the trial came to a close — saying the terrorists were “sabotaging” justice.
“They wouldn’t wear the earphones to hear the translator . . . and then they started to question the judge,” said Burke, whose son, Matt, died in the WTC.
“It sounded like the judge was on trial. That’s when I got up and left.”
The pilot’s sister, Burlingame, said she was enraged by lawyer Cheryl Bormann’s wearing a traditional Muslim get-up.
“It’s very difficult to watch a defense counsel in full Arab dress stand up and [claim] that the uniformed female officers are inappropriately dressed,” she said.
The case against KSM
KHALID SHEIK MOHAMMED
Accused terror mastermind KSM and four others face 2,976 charges of murder for each person killed on 9/11, along with a host of other charges for their alleged role in the Sept. 11 attacks. Most of the charges carry a maximum penalty of death.
Charges include:
* Murder in violation of the law of war (Death)
* Terrorism (Death)
* Hijacking or hazarding a vessel or aircraft (Death)
* Conspiracy (Death)
* Attacking civilians (Death)
* Intentionally causing serious bodily injury (Death)
* Providing material support for terrorism (Life in prison)
* Attacking civilian objects (20 years)
* Destruction of property in violation of the law of war (10 years)
ALSO CHARGED
* Ali Abdul Aziz Ali: Pakistani national and nephew of KSM, who allegedly provided money to the hijackers.
* Walid bin Attash: Yemeni who allegedly ran an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan and researched flight simulators and timetables. Alleged mastermind of 2000 bombing of USS Cole.
* Ramzi bin al Shibh: Yemeni allegedly chosen to be a hijacker; he couldn’t get a US visa and ended up providing aid, such as finding flight schools.
* Mustafa Ahmed al Hawsawi: Saudi who allegedly helped the hijackers with cash, credit cards and clothing.
WHAT COMES NEXT
* Defendants will return to court June 12.
* Prosecutors and defense lawyers will engage in extensive evidence discovery and motions that will require hearings, just as in civilian courts.
* When motions are settled, court will empanel a jury of active-duty commissioned military officers.
* As in civilian court, the suspects are innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
* All 12 jurors must agree to convict on death-penalty charges. On non-death-penalty military charges, a two-thirds vote is required for conviction.
* Trial is not expected to be finished for years — and will likely be followed by years of appeals.