Justice

It appears you can talk all manners of trash about the vilest and most murderous despot the world had ever known. Is there no justice?

Josef Stalin's grandson, Yevgeny Dzhugashvili, sued a Russian newspaper for libel after it claimed Stalin personally ordered the killing of Soviet citizens. He requested an apology, and of course, some money. But alas, the courts threw it out and it appears it wasn't even a show trial. For shame.  Dzhugashvili has five days to appeal, thus saving the glorious image of his grandfather.

Stalin starved millions of Ukrainians to death during his attempt at collectivization, jailed and murdered dissidents and even those suspected of possibly being dissidents. He institutionalized the Gulag, killed every single other official from the beginning of the revolution and ended up ordering more deaths in one day than Pinochet did in his entire reign. He turned neighbors against each other and forced poor Soviet schoolchildren to read his feeble attempt at prose.

But Dzhugashvili doesn't think we need to bring that up.

The BBC reports that many think the libel case was a way for the Kremlin to try to rehabilitate Stalin's image.

The ruling further proves that you can criticize leaders in Russia all you want, just not the current ones.

DMITRY KOSTYUKOV/AFP/Getty Images

After Silvio Berlusconi's lawyers broke out the "Animal Farm" defense that the prime minister should be first above equals, the Constitutional Court had heard enough, and today they stripped Berlusconi of his immunity.

The prime minister's camp has already called the shocking ruling politically motivated. And the opposition has resumed calls for him to resign. Berlusconi maintains that he will not step down, and that the immunity law protected him from distractions brought upon him by the judiciary.

As of now, none of the three frozen cases have been re-opened; however it may be a matter of time until Berlusconi finds himself on trial for a seventh time.  

ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP/Getty Images

In 2007, the London Review of Books published a piece entitled "Inconvenient Truths" about the conviction and subsequent appeals of Libyan intelligence agent Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi for the bombing of Pan-Am flight 103. The article, written by Hugh Miles, explained that even at the time of the conviction there were many questions, and that al-Megrahi's appeal (which he withdrew in order to be released on medical grounds last week) had a chance of succeeding. 

Lawyers, politicians, diplomats and relatives of Lockerbie victims now believe that the former Libyan intelligence officer is innocent. Robert Black QC, an emeritus professor of Scottish law at Edinburgh University, was one of the architects of the original trial in Holland. He has closely followed developments since the disaster happened and in 2000 devised the non-jury trial system for the al-Megrahi case.

Evenbefore the trial he was so sure the evidence against al-Megrahi would not stand up in court that he is on record as saying that a convictio nwould be impossible. When I asked how he feels about this remark now, Black replied: ‘I am still absolutely convinced that I am right. No reasonable tribunal, on the evidence heard at the original trial, should or could have convicted him and it is an absolute disgrace and outrage what the Scottish court did.’

In this context the outrage over al-Megrahi's release by Scotland last week--because he has terminal cancer --might need to be reevaluated. The same goes for resultant anger over Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi's visit to the U.N. and New York in September. Following up on the London Review of Books' blog this week, Glen Newey makes the astute, if impolitic point that the release, and drop of al-Megrahi's appeal, was likely best for the political fortunes of everyone involved:

It served nobody’s interests to have the Lockerbie bombing conviction debated in open court. Hence the great good fortune of al-Megrahi’s terminal prostate cancer, which sped his release from Greenock. With a ‘compassionate’ wave of the biro, the SNP administration has rid itselfof a high-profile prisoner with an unsafe conviction and enhanced, orcreated, its international profile. The UK government can keep in withthe Libyans and protect its commercial contracts, on the plea ofrespecting devolved powers. Meanwhile, in a rerun of the Cold War great game, we need to oil our way into the Colonel’s tent ahead of the Bear: recently Russia has been angling for a naval base in Benghazi. So even the Obama administration has reason to mute its complaints. It’s almost enough to make one believe in divine providence.

None of this, of course, is any consolation to the families of the bombing victims, but it gives a very plausible explanation for what might be going on behind the scenes.

To be clear, it is unlikely officials could fake the cancer diagnosis and Al-Megrahi does not look very well in the photos of his departure from Scotland. But well, who knows? Maybe he'll make a miraculous recovery at home in Libya.

DANNY LAWSON/AFP/Getty Images

German Judge Albert Bartz has taken issue with laws that ban drivers from talking on handsets while driving but do not address many other potentially more distracting activities, including sexual activity. 

"The police have no legal basis for taking action against a driver who is, for example, letting their left hand dangle out of the open car window while they use their right hand to work on a laptop that's sitting on the passenger's seat and steer the car with their thighs," Bartz said. "In my opinion, the current legislation is outdated." 

The judge considered the law while handling the case of a man who appealed his fine for talking while driving. Bartz insists however that he does not have personal motivation for his legal position. 

Bartz emphasized that he has never been caught using his mobile phone in the car and that he also avoids other risky activities while driving. As he told the mass circulation daily Bild: "Sex at the steering wheel is strictly off-limits for me."

Bartz forwarded the statute on to Germany's highest court, the Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe, for further review.  

Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

It isn't just Congress that's stalling Barack Obama's hopes for closing the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay.

Ordinary Americans favor keeping Gitmo open by a two-to-one margin, according to a new USA Today/Gallup survey released today. The survey, conducted by phone among 1,015 adults, also suggests that a sizeable number think Gitmo's helped make the country safer:

By 40%-18%, [respondents] said the prison had strengthened national security rather than weakened it.

Those who want the prison to remain open feel more strongly on the subject tha[n] those who want to close it. A 54% majority of those polled say the prison shouldn't be closed, and that they'll be upset if the administration moves forward to close it."

All of Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee's just-declassified memo on the interrogation of Al Qaeda commander Abu Zubayda makes for pretty chilling reading. But for me, the extensive discussion over the circumstances under which it would be permissible to lock him in a box with an insect (he apparently was known to have a fear of them) really stands out as evidence of officials having completely lost touch with reality:

In addition to using the confinement boxes alone, you also would like to introduce an insect into one of the boxes with Zubaydah. As we understand it, you plan to inform Zubaydah that you are going to place a stinging insect into the box, but you will actually place a harmless insect in the box, such as a caterpillar. If you do so, to ensure that you are outside the predicate act requirement, you must inform him that the insects will not have a sting that would produce death or severe pain. If, however, you were to place the insect in the box without informing him that you are doing so, then, in order to not commit a predicate act, you should not affirmatively lead him to believe that any insect is present which has a sting that could produce severe pain or suffering or even cause his death. [Redacted section] so long as you take either of the approaches we have described, the insect's placement in the box would not constitue a threat of severe physical pain or suffering to a reasonable person in his position. 

The rest of the memos are here.

It's been a tense day for constitutional lawyers, national security reporters, and foreign policy wonks. Why? This afternoon, the Obama administration intends to release memos relating to the controversial "enhanced interrogation" policies of CIA officers in overseas prisons.

There have been careful negotiations between the CIA, Justice Department, and White House over the contents of the release, and it seems the officers involved have been granted immunity from prosecution as a result. 

The full set of documents should be released here sometime within the hour. 

Update: The only redactions are the officers' names. 

Update: Read the memos here. 

Scott Horton reports that Spanish prosecutors will indict high-ranking members of the Bush administration over allegations of detainee abuse and torture.

The six are: former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales; former head of the Office of Legal Counsel Jay Bybee; former OLC lawyer John Yoo; former Defense Department lawyer William J. Haynes II; David Addington, a former adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney; and former Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith.

Horton explains the context of the case:

The case arises in the context of a pending proceeding before the court involving terrorism charges against five Spaniards formerly held at Guantánamo. A group of human-rights lawyers originally filed a criminal complaint asking the court to look at the possibility of charges against the six American lawyers. Baltasar Garzón Real, the investigating judge, accepted the complaint and referred it to Spanish prosecutors for a view as to whether they would accept the case and press it forward. [They found sufficient evidence.]

The case won't come before Judge Real, though; he also was involved in a terrorism case against the five Spaniards held in Guantanamo. 

What does it all mean?

Well, John Yoo won't be vacationing on the Costa del Sol this summer. Were any of the Bush Six to step foot in Spain, they would be arrested. 

More importantly: Spain has said that it would drop the cases if the United States would investigate the claim. Thus far, the U.S. Department of Justice and the White House haven't responded. But the indictment may force the administration's hand, spurring a response to the allegations.

For, ultimately, the issue may have more political potency than judicial importance. It's up to U.S. President Barack Obama to dictate whether and how the strong allegations of legal abuses in the Bush administration will be resolved.