Justice? Nope, but nice try

Jose Padilla, the so-called "dirty bomb plotter", was sentenced to 17 years in prison yesterday, after being convicted on terrorism charges that had nothing whatsoever to do with plotting to set off a dirty bomb.

I say "so-called", because when he was arrested, the Federal "authorities" crowed loudly about how they had foiled a masterpiece of a terror plot, and that they had mountains of evidence to prove it. Well, Padilla was never charged with any such crime (or any crime at all, for that matter), and was instead spirited off to a Navy brig in South Carolina for 3 1/2 years, only to be charged in an entirely different case in Miami, Florida when it became clear that the Supreme Court was going to order that Padilla be either charged or released, as they properly should have.

In an ironic twist, the judge didn't even give Padilla credit for time served for his years of detention.

I don't want to be misunderstood here. Jose Padilla is a sniveling worm of a gangbanging drug dealer who very likely was an al-Quaida recruit bent on causing harm to American citizens in this country. If he was indeed planning such an event, he should be tried, convicted, and given the needle. I won't lose ten seconds of sleep over his fate.

However, Padilla is a native-born U.S. citizen arrested in this country, and is therefore entitled to his full Constitutional rights and protections, things which were denied to him for close to four years, until his situation got to be just a little too hot of a potato for the government to handle. His situation makes a mockery of the Constitution, which for example protects all speech, however hateful and inflammatory, as well as the rights of all arrested citizens, not just ones charged with more mundane crimes.

You see, the Founders wrote the Constitution with the Padillas and Larry Flynts of the country in mind, just not those individuals specifically. The protections enumerated in the document are designed to ensure that even the most unpopular things in society, such as radical political ideas and people accused of committing unspeakable crimes, are given their fair day in court, and not just stifled or made to disappear by the government. There is no "terrorism exception", as far as I know.

Why does this case bother me so much? Because it could happen to you or I tomorrow, and we'd have no way of defending ourselves. Imagine black-clad goons kicking down your door this evening and hauling you away to an "undisclosed location", with no access to a lawyer or your family or friends, and without your being told why you were being held. Meanwhile, the Attorney General goes on TV to brag about nabbing a suspected terrorist, John or Jane Doe, who was hiding out in your suburban neighborhood cooking up all kinds of mayhem. How do you even begin to defend yourself against those circumstances?

Do you see my point? If we let this happen to one citizen of our country, no matter how evil or dastardly they are, and no matter what they are accused of plotting, then the precedent is set for it to happen to any of us.