Manuel de Jesus Familia Rosario has been a permanent resident in the U.S. since 1999, and entered a guilty plea in federal court in 2007 for aiding and abetting a conspiracy involving “importation into the United States of any alien for the purpose of prostitution, or for any other immoral purpose,” reports Court House News.

Familia Rosario was allowed a light sentence when prosecutors admitted he was a minor participant in the prostitution business. He immediately faced deportation action following his release from prison, and he fought the move. He argued that because he had been in the country for five years without any convictions, he was eligible for a waiver of deportation. Immigration judges and officials disagreed. But the 7th Court of Appeals on Wednesday said he could not be removed.

“While the plea agreement showed that Familia Rosario had knowledge of the object of the conspiracy and aided and abetted the conspiracy, it stretches the bounds of logic to suggest that his conduct, distributing condoms, was conduct that ‘related to’ the owning, controlling, managing or supervising of a prostitution business,” Judge Ann Claire Williams wrote for the court.

“While condoms are mandatory for the operation of prostitution businesses in some jurisdictions … and are certainly ‘essential’ in the sense that their use among commercial sex workers has proven to help stem the spread of HIV and other diseases … we note that there was no regulation requiring their use in this case, and that the business of prostitution has historically been able to be managed, owned, controlled and supervised without such precautions,” she added.

In some jurisdictions, like Washington D.C., carrying three of more condoms is enough to be charged with prostitution.

Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person convicted in a U.S. court on criminal charges related to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, lost a bid on Monday to overturn his guilty plea and his sentence of life in prison.

A U.S. appeals court rejected arguments by Moussaoui, who is serving his sentence at a supermaximum federal security prison in Colorado, that his guilty plea was invalid because the U.S. government failed to turn over classified evidence that could have helped in his defense.

Just 30 percent oppose using such methods on the 23-year-old Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who allegedly attempted to blow up a plane en route to Detroit on Christmas Day. Twelve percent are not sure.

Male and younger voters are more supportive of aggressive techniques than women and older voters, and Republicans and independents favor using them more than Democrats, Rasmussen reports.

What’s more, 71 percent of U.S. voters think that Abdulmutallab should be investigated by military authorities as a terrorist, rather than being treated as a civilian. Only 22 percent say he should be treated as a civilian criminal, which is his current status.

Abdulmutallab has been charged with attempting to blow up an aircraft and kill U.S. civilians by federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of Michigan.

The arguments made in the Ghailani case are a good indication of the kinds of claims that the suspected co-conspirators of the 9/11 terrorist attacks may make when their case begins in the same federal courthouse next year. The government’s response in this case similarly reveals how it’s likely to oppose any moves to dismiss the 9/11 cases.

The government’s argument in the Ghailani case can be summed up as: 1) it’s Ghailani’s own fault for being a fugitive before Sept. 11, 2001, while his co-conspirators all got prompt trials in New York; and 2) after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the need for intelligence trumped all, and the speedy trial requirement got thrown out the window.

The way the government explains is it is somewhat more artful. After 9/11, the United States was at war. So Ghailani, who’d previously been charged as a civilian criminal along with other suspects, who were tried and convicted earlier in 2001, was suddenly transformed into a war criminal. And that changed all of the rules.

Given the threat of another major terrorist attack after 9/11, “the Government had shifted dramatically toward intelligence-gathering as the primary means to prevent such an attack.” When Ghailani was captured in 2004, “the defendant was believed to have, and in fact did have, actionable intelligence about al Qaeda — by virtue of his longstanding position in al Qaeda, his assistance to known al Qaeda terrorists” and his alleged ongoing relationship with Osama bin Laden.

Of course, none of these relationships had actually been proven by the time the government captured Ghailani, since he hadn’t had any sort of trial. But the government’s argument is that because he was believed to have information about al-Qaeda, it was justified in detaining him in a CIA prison, and then at the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay for another five years.

“In light of these extraordinary circumstances, the Government justifiably opted to initially treat the defendant as an intelligence asset,” the government writes.

The details of Ghailani’s imprisonment and interrogation by the CIA are all redacted in the government’s brief. But in the brief asking the court to dismiss the case, Ghailani’s lawyers argue that he was physically and psychologically abused during two years of overseas CIA imprisonment and interrogations at places where techniques “amounting to torture” had been authorized. Ghailani was also denied the right to a lawyer.

Ghailani was eventually charged in 2008 by the military commissions, but that proceeding was stalled after President Obama took office. Ghailani’s case was transferred to a civilian federal court in May.

“We respectfully submit that this case presents possibly the most unique and egregious example of a speedy trial violation in American jurisprudence to date,” Ghailani’s lawyers wrote in their brief.

The right to a speedy trial derives from the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Supreme Court, however, said in a 1972 case that judges should weigh several factors in deciding whether the right had been violated, including the length of the delay and its reason, whether the defendant himself was to blame, and whether the delay would prejudice the defendant’s case.

Ghailani’s lawyers have said that their client “appears to be so damaged” by his treatment in U.S. that he may be unable to help his lawyers prepare his defense. They’ve asked the court to have an expert examine the mental state of their client.

Here is the Justice Department’s brief:

Today, The Washington Independent unveils a new feature that will track the outcomes of habeas corpus cases filed by Guantanamo Bay detainees who have challenged their indefinite detentions in the federal court system.

The Gitmo Habeas Scoreboard is broken up into two sections: cases won by detainees — further divided between detainees who have been released and those still in custody — and cases won by the U.S. government. Using information compiled by Pro Publica and David Remes, legal director of Appeal for Justice, the accompanying charts feature background information on all 41 detainees whose cases have been decided to date, including the allegations against each detainee, the court’s reasoning in each decision, and the status of any appeals. As more cases are resolved, we’ll keep updating the chart.

Of the 41 cases heard so far, detainees have won 32 of them. That means that in 32 out of 41 cases, the government was unable to present enough evidence, including classified evidence, to convince a federal court judge that it’s more likely than not that the detainee was a member or substantial supporter of al-Qaeda or the Taliban. (Habeas cases are civil proceedings, where there is no need to establish guilt “beyond a reasonable doubt,” as in criminal trials.)

Of the 32 cases the government has lost, it has appealed only two. Eight detainees who have lost their cases have appealed so far.

Meanwhile, many of the prisoners who have won their petitions for habeas corpus are still imprisoned at Gitmo. Although the court in each case ordered the government to arrange for the detainee’s expeditious release, in some cases the government can’t or won’t send the prisoner back to where he came from. In some cases, that’s either because the detainee legitimately fears persecution at home, as in the case of the Uighurs. In others, it’s because, as with the prisoners from Yemen, the U.S. government doesn’t trust the detainee’s home government to keep him from joining up with local terror groups upon his return.

As a result, of the 32 detainees who have won an order of release in a U.S. federal court, 11 remain in prison.

For a full breakdown of all the cases, see the Gitmo Habeas Scoreboard here.

Musa’ab Al-Madhwani has been imprisoned at Guantanamo since October 2002. The government claims he was a member of al-Qaeda. On Monday, U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan agreed that the government had shown that it’s more likely than not that Madhwani was a member of the terrorist organization at the time. However, he added, Madhwani does not appear to be dangerous now, the judge added.

“There is nothing in the record now that he poses any greater threat than those detainees who have already been released,” Judge Hogan said in court, according to the Washington Post, adding that Madhwani has been a model prisoner over the past seven years.

The government’s case was based almost entirely on Madhwani’s own statements to interrogators and military officials. The government argued that Madhwani traveled to Pakistan, joined al-Qaeda, trained at an al-Qaeda camp, traveled with al-Qaeda members, and was involved in a firefight with Pakistani authorities before his arrest.

Although Judge Hogan discounted the statements made to interrogators, saying they were “tainted by abusive interrogation techniques,” he did not believe the statements made to officials at military hearings were tainted.

Military records reveal that Madhwani admitted to receiving firearms training at an al-Qaeda camp and once seeing al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Khan is one of fewer than two dozen “high-value” detainees at the prison camp, believed to be a senior member of al-Qaeda or an insider in its terror network. He is a legal U.S. resident who lived in Baltimore before moving to Pakistan. The government is considering bringing him to trial in a civilian court in Brooklyn.

Although it’s not clear why his case in particular would be brought to New York, the AP reports that it may be because Khan allegedly met with a man in 2001 who later pleaded guilty to plotting to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge.

Military officials also say Khan funneled money to al-Qaeda and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and helped fund an attack on a Marriott Hotel in Indonesia in 2003. That attack killed 12 people and injured 144 more, including two U.S. citizens, the AP reports.

Khan was captured in 2003.

“The decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in New York City and give him all the benefits and perks reserved for American citizens is a slap in the face of the 9/11 victim’s families, the American people, and the men and women who risk their lives to defend our liberties each and every day,” said Bachmann in a statement released after the press conference.

Curiously, many of those protesting the accused terrorists’ trial in federal court repeatedly refer to a federal court trial and its attendant due process rights as being “reserved for U.S. citizens.” At a rally last weekend in New York City, for example, protesters and speakers repeatedly objected that the 9/11 defendants were being given “the same rights as U.S. citizens.”

In fact, the “right” to be prosecuted in a U.S. federal court has never been “reserved” for U.S. citizens at all. It’s historically been a “right” accorded to anyone who commits a crime on U.S. soil. Thus everyone from a U.S.-born citizen to an illegal alien who commits a federal crime in the United States gets tried in federal court. Although the government has just recently created special military commissions to try some crimes against U.S. military targets abroad, we don’t normally create new courts or legal systems to try non-citizens who commit mass murder, mail fraud, or any other crimes that might land them in federal court.

“If President Obama admits that we are a nation at war, then we should act like one,” continued Bachmann in her statement. “Justice for the 9/11 attackers should be swift and conclusive, something that won’t be done when KSM exploits the abundant appeals and legal loopholes he has been inexplicably awarded as a foreign combatant,” said Bachmann.

Bachmann didn’t mention that there have been only three military commission trials since they were created by President George W. Bush because detainees challenged the constitutionality of the military commissions — and won.

The proceedings that began last week under the supposedly new-and-improved military commissions signed into law by President Obama already suggest that we’ll be seeing more of the same.

Mohammed Al-Adahi testified in June in a hearing on the merits of his petition for habeas corpus — his claim that he was being unlawfully detained by the U.S. government. In August, the 47-year-old father of two won that case, and Judge Kessler ordered that the government arrange for his release. The government has appealed.

Earlier, however, Judge Kessler had also ordered that the government videotape al-Adahi’s testimony and redact any classified information from it. The government notified her in July that it had “inadvertently” failed to do that.

Al-Adahi’s lawyer asked the Judge to hold the government in contempt for violating her order and effectively concealing the detainee’s testimony. Today, Kessler did just that.

Because the government claimed that its failure to videotape the testimony was an accident caused by “oversight and miscommunication,” the judge did not find criminal contempt, but civil contempt. That means no government lawyers will go to jail for violating her order, but they’ll have to post the detainee’s testimony publicly and ensure the court that the mistake won’t happen again.

“Attorney General Holder testified here not long ago about his decision to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other terrorsts to New York for civilian trials, which is an action that makes your mission more difficult,” Sessions said to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who is slated to testify.

“Bringing foreign nationals into the United States allows them to take advantage of certain immigration laws and assert special rights,” he continued. “At the last oversight hearing the attorney general seemed unaware of the consequences,” including that it “has the potential of resulting in their being released into the United States.”

Sessions didn’t mention that Holder also testified at that hearing that even if KSM and his alleged co-conspirators are acquitted at trial, the U.S. government would continue to hold them indefinitely under the laws of war as “unprivileged enemy belligerents.”