Former USF professor Sami Al-Arian is entitled to more humane treatment while awaiting his January 2005 trial in prison.
Published August 20, 2003
Sami Al-Arian is a thoroughly unsympathetic character, and federal authorities have presented substantial evidence linking him to Mideast terrorism. We hold no brief for Al-Arian, but under our system of justice he is entitled to the presumption of innocence and to due process - nothing more, nothing less.
Al-Arian's trial on terrorism charges is still 18 months away. Meanwhile, the former University of South Florida professor is being held in conditions usually reserved for criminal monsters. If this punishing confinement is an effort by the federal government to wear down Al-Arian physically and mentally so he doesn't have the capability to mount a defense, it is a deplorable tactic. Al-Arian's case will be watched by the Muslim world, and he should be tried through a fair process that leaves no doubt that justice was done.
Al-Arian is being held without bond at Coleman Correctional Facility in Sumter County on charges that he provided key support to the Middle Eastern terror group, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which has been linked to more than 100 deaths. He is being held in the Special Housing Unit of the prison, a place for violent and uncontrollable convicts, in a windowless 7-by-13-foot cell that he shares with another inmate. Al-Arian has been denied a watch or clock and the artificial light in his cell is always on. Recreation consists of one hour, five days a week, when Al-Arian may walk around another steel cage.
In a letter sent to the Federal Bureau of Prisons in June, Amnesty International calls it "gratuitously punitive." The group says his conditions "are inconsistent with international standards and treaties which require that all persons deprived of liberty must be treated humanely."
While Al-Arian might require greater oversight than other prisoners, possibly for his own protection, he should be given a reasonable modicum of comfort. The kind of humiliations heaped upon him by prison staff, including shackling him every time he's moved, and forcing him to bend over and carry papers on his back when meeting with visitors, are displays worthy of a Bernard Malamud-inspired gulag. At least a federal judge stepped in to stop the constant strip searching.
Currently, Al-Arian is asking a judge for some extended privileges, including unmonitored all-day telephone use, access to a better legal library and contact visits with prospective witnesses. Al-Arian recently won the right to defend himself, a situation that will inevitably complicate his confinement for prison officials. Still, he has a constitutional right to the materials needed to prepare a defense.
Some of Al-Arian's requests are inconsistent with prison security, but some should be granted. He should be given access to the audio and videotapes related to his case as well as all relevant legal documents. That he has been denied writing paper and pencils is indefensible. It is essential to his defense that he be given the freedom to write and access to a reasonably complete law library.
Al-Arian has already been denied his right to a speedy trial. His trial is now scheduled to begin in January 2005, and because he has also been denied bond, Al-Arian will have to await his court date behind bars. Meanwhile, the government appears to be doing all it can to break the man and make it more difficult for him to mount a defense. This is no way to win a conviction or treat an accused person, not even an alleged terrorist.
