Padilla's Lawyers Ask for Review of Powers

Padilla's Lawyers Ask for Review of Powers
By TONI LOCY, Associated Press Writer

Lawyers for Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen held as an
"enemy combatant" for nearly four years, want the
Supreme Court to resolve how much power a president
has while the nation is at war.

Lawyers Donna Newman and Andrew Patel told the high
court in papers filed Tuesday that the justices must
step in "to preserve the vital checks and balances" on
the president.

They cited the Bush administration's interpretation of
the president's war powers to justify its decision to
hold Padilla ? until recently ? without charges in a
military brig in South Carolina.

Padilla's lawyers also said President Bush abused his
war powers authority by approving warrantless
surveillance of conversations between people in the
United States and abroad who had suspected terrorist
ties.

Such developments "underscore the need for this court
to address the fundamental constitutional questions
presented by this case," the lawyers wrote.

"The government continues to defend this sweeping view
of the president's power to substitute military law
for the rule of law and seeks to expand it further,
arguing that the very authorities that it says justify
the indefinite detention without charge of citizens
also justify widespread spying on citizens without
judicial warrant or Congressional notification,"
Padilla's lawyers said.

Padilla's appeal deals not only with the broad
questions of presidential power, but also seeks to
resolve whether Padilla should remain in military or
civilian custody.

Last week, the Richmond-based 4th U.S. Court of
Appeals urged the Supreme Court to take the case after
chastising the administration for shifting its tactics
in the Padilla case and warning the government that it
was risking its credibility with the courts.

A three-judge appellate panel refused the
administration's request to vacate a September ruling
that gave Bush wide authority to detain "enemy
combatants" indefinitely without charges on U.S. soil.

The decision, written by Judge J. Michael Luttig,
questioned why the administration used one set of
facts before the court for 3 1/2 years to justify
holding Padilla without charges but used another set
to convince a grand jury in Florida to indict him last
month.

Padilla, a former Chicago gang member, was arrested in
2002 at Chicago's O'Hare Airport as he returned to the
United States from Afghanistan. Initially,
then-Attorney General John Ashcroft alleged Padilla
planned to set off a radiological device known as a
"dirty bomb."

The administration then argued before federal courts
in New York and Virginia that Padilla should be held
without charges because he had come home to carry out
an al-Qaida backed plot to blow up apartment buildings
in New York, Washington or Florida.

Last month, a grand jury in Miami charged Padilla with
being part of a North American terror support cell
that allegedly raised funds and recruited fighters to
wage violent jihad outside the United States.