In advocating the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison in May 2009, Obama said, “Nobody has ever escaped from one of our federal supermax prisons, which hold hundreds of convicted terrorists.”

By Fred Lucas at CNSNews.com

The Justice Department included non-terrorists on a list provided to members of the U.S. Senate as back-up for President Barack Obama’s and Attorney General Eric Holder’s claims that hundreds of terrorists have been convicted in civilian federal courts.

In advocating the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison in May 2009, Obama said, “Nobody has ever escaped from one of our federal supermax prisons, which hold hundreds of convicted terrorists.”

That remark sparked the curiosity of Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who wrote Attorney General Eric Holder asking for the names and offenses of those “hundreds” of terrorists convicted in civilian courts and sent to civilian prisons.

Kyl did not get a prompt response.

Then Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked Holder about Kyl’s request at a Nov. 18 hearing. Holder responded: “I will supply you with those 300 names and what they were convicted of. I’ll be glad to do that.”

Like Kyl before him, Sessions did not get a prompt response.

Then in February, in a letter defending his decision to prosecute Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab (the would-be Northwest Flight 253 underwear bomber) in a civilian court rather than a military tribunal, Holder told Senate Republicans: “In keeping with this policy [of trying terrorists in civilian courts], the Bush administration used the criminal justice system to convict more than 300 individuals on terrorism related charges.”

This prompted yet another request from Senate Republicans for a list of the 300 people who were convicted in civilian courts on terrorism charges.

Finally, on March 26, the Justice Department sent a list of 403 names to the Senate Judiciary Committee.  But a preliminary review by CNSNews.com found that more than 30 of the names on that list had nothing to do with terrorism.

FULL STORY

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