Confess or Else!

This may sound like one of the many Faux News Strawmen, but some people do say “that if you confess you must be guilty.” Those of us who are familiar with the Criminal “Justice” System know otherwise.

Here is a case in point:

October 31, 2007

About New York

Roots of False Confession: Spotlight Is Now on the F.B.I.

By JIM DWYER

This month, Abdallah Higazy managed to crawl from the landslide of forgotten history on a slow-motion journey toward the truth.

Mr. Higazy, now 36, was briefly — and wrongly — known as a mysterious figure who fled a hotel room directly across Church Street from the World Trade Center on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, leaving behind a Koran, an Egyptian passport and an aviation radio that might have allowed him to communicate with the hijacked airliners that flew into the towers. A security guard reported the discovery of these items.

After first adamantly denying any knowledge of the aviation radio, and then sitting in solitary confinement for 10 days, Mr. Higazy finally conceded. It was his radio, he confessed. He was charged with making false statements.

One month after Mr. Higazy was locked up, the story took a sharp turn.

An airline pilot walked into the hotel asking for the very same radio, saying that he had left it behind in his room on the morning of Sept. 11. The pilot, a United States citizen from the Midwest, knew nothing about Mr. Higazy. On further inquiry, the hotel security guard then admitted that he had lied about where he had found the radio. He later pleaded guilty to making false statements to the F.B.I.

And so it was discovered that Mr. Higazy, an engineering student at Brooklyn Polytech who was being put up at the hotel by the federal agency that was sponsoring him, had confessed to something he had not done, and to a crime that had not taken place.

Why?

Only now are some answers emerging from a civil rights lawsuit brought by Mr. Higazy that has been grinding through the federal courts. In a decision released two weeks ago that allows Mr. Higazy’s lawsuit to proceed, an appeals court said that if his claims are all true, then a jury could conclude that his confession was obtained by the force of threats.

So far, all parties agree on one thing: A fear of brutal handling and outright torture by Egyptian security forces loomed over the interrogation when Mr. Higazy made his false confession.

Mr. Higazy says that when he was questioned on Dec. 27, 2001, an F.B.I. agent raised the specter of Egyptian security forces’ tormenting his family to get him to drop his denials about the radio.

The government says that no such threat was made. While Egyptian security was discussed during the interrogation, Justice Department lawyers said, that was only because Mr. Higazy had raised the subject. Moreover, the government said, he could have stopped the questioning at any time to speak with his lawyer.

The decision released on Oct. 19 quoted from sealed testimony by Michael Templeton, the F.B.I. agent who questioned Mr. Higazy.

Mr. Templeton said he did not threaten Mr. Higazy. But, the ruling noted, Agent Templeton was aware of the fierce reputation of the Egyptian security forces.

“Templeton later admitted that he knew how the Egyptian security forces operated: ‘that they had a security service, that their laws are different than ours, that they are probably allowed to do things in that country where they don’t advise people of their rights, they don’t — yeah, probably about torture, sure,’ ” Judge Rosemary Pooler wrote.

Mr. Higazy said he felt utterly cornered during his questioning, according to the decision. The agent told him that if he did not cooperate, the authorities would “make sure that Egyptian security gives my family hell,” Mr. Higazy said. “I knew that I couldn’t prove my innocence, and I knew that my family was in danger.”

The agent, however, has given a different account, according to an internal Justice Department report. He was trying to administer a polygraph test that had been requested by Mr. Higazy and his lawyer. Agent Templeton “stated that he asked Higazy about the Egyptian security services in order to alleviate any concerns that might be a barrier to Higazy’s successful completion of the examination. The polygrapher stated that this was the only time during the examination that the Egyptian security services was mentioned.”

The F.B.I. does not tape its interviews and interrogations, so there is no known recording of the encounter between Agent Templeton and Mr. Higazy. The appeals court ruling may mean that a jury will ultimately decide who is telling the truth about the events of almost six years ago.

“We’re now going to get disclosure and a trial on whether or not his constitutional rights were violated,” said Jonathan Abady, a lawyer for Mr. Higazy.

As for Mr. Higazy, he went on to complete the engineering program at Brooklyn Polytech. He is now teaching computer engineering in Cairo, Mr. Abady said, and he had a simple reaction to the news that his case will go ahead: “relief.”

Thankfully the Second Circuit did the right thing in this instance (even if there was that little problem with the pulled opinion) and Mr. Higazy will get his day in court. Maybe then “we the people” and our duly elected officials can have an actually thoughtful discussion and meaningful resolution to the scourge of the “Justice” System: False Confessions!

Update: And as we all know “Waterboarding,” e.g.“Torture,” wasn’t even necessary to extract this false confession. Which, as we all know, is what “Torture” is all about!

Things that make you go “Hmmm!” Or Not!