Metro

Ex-Gitmo detainee wasn’t denied a speedy trial: judge

The first Guantanamo Bay detainee brought to the U.S. to face charges in a civilian court failed today in a bid to avoid prosecution on grounds he was denied a speedy trial during the nearly five years he was held by the CIA and American military.

Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani was legitimately interrogated by the CIA “for roughly two years at one or more secret sites in an effort to obtain information for use in defending the United States and its interests,” Manhattan federal Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled this morning.

And the alleged al Qaeda operative’s subsequent detention at Gitmo was based on the former Bush administration’s plan to try him before a military commission — a decision reversed by President Obama after he took office in January 2009, Kaplan said.

“In this case, Ghailani would have been detained as an enemy combatant throughout the period of the government’s delay of this prosecution,” the judge wrote.

Kaplan also said “there is no evidence that the government ever acted in bad faith to gain a tactical advantage over or to prejudice Ghailani,” a former cook and bodyguard for Osama bin Laden who’s charged in the 1998 African embassy bombings that killed 224 people.

Ghailani’s trial — at which he will face life in prison — is set to begin Sept. 27.

His defense lawyers didn’t immediately return calls for comment.

ACLU lawyer Ben Wizner said: “It is essential that this decision not be construed as a green light for secret detention and abusive interrogation.”

“The court’s decision not to impose the harsh consequence of dismissing the charges against Ghailani only underscores the vital need for other forms of accountability, including criminal investigations of the officials who authorized torture and civil remedies for torture victims,” Wizner said.