Detainee Attorney Seeks to Suppress Interrogations

Attorneys for a Guantanamo Bay prisoner asked a federal judge Wednesday to exclude as evidence against him the statements he made during at least 57 interrogations since his capture, saying they were the result of torture and other coercion.

Because of the detainee's treatment, some of his statements have already been suppressed by a U.S. military judge in his trial before a military commission. Now his lawyers also want them excluded from their separate effort to have the U.S. District Court here release him from prison.

Mohammed Jawad was arrested in December 2002 and accused of tossing a grenade at an unmarked Jeep in an attack that wounded two U.S. soldiers and their interpreter. Jawad's attorneys say he was only about 12 years old at the time, although there aren't records of his birth in a refugee camp in Pakistan. The Pentagon says a bone scan shows Jawad was older, about 17, when he was arrested.

Last October, a military judge threw out a confession made by Jawad following his arrest. The judge found that Jawad initially denied throwing the grenade and only admitted it after Afghan authorities threatened to kill Jawad and his family if he didn't.

The military tribunals at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, prison allow evidence obtained through coercion but not torture, leaving it to the judge to decide when the line between coercion and torture is crossed. In Jawad's case, the judge found the threats made by the Afghans were torture.

Afghan officials turned Jawad over to U.S. custody shortly after he confessed. He was questioned by U.S. officials overnight. The military judge also said Jawad's statements during that interrogation couldn't be used because they were tainted by the torture at the hands of the Afghans just a few hours earlier.

Jawad was held in Afghanistan for about seven weeks before his transfer to the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo. He's been there ever since and is suing for his release.