The slow pace of the case against the 9/11 defendants frustrates survivors and families

Guantanamo Naval Base.- Nearly 25 years after the September 11, 2001 attacks, family members of the victims and a survivor attending the hearings at the Guantanamo naval base express a mixture of frustration and skepticism about a case that remains stalled in its preliminary phase but continues to mark a large part of their lives. For them, the problem goes beyond the complexity of the process against the alleged "mastermind" of 9/11, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and his co-defendants, and lies mainly in the architecture created by the United States to try them in its military enclave in southern Cuba, where it came to hold about 780 men in a maximum security prison. Colleen Kelly, a nurse from New York and sister of William Kelly Jr., one of the victims of the World Trade Center, criticized Washington's decision to use a new system of military commissions "that had not been tested" before, instead of trying them in federal courts. He warned EFE that this has caused "everything to be discussed and have to be resolved from scratch," contributing to the duration of the hearings on the island, whose remoteness complicates the hearings and contributes to decreasing their frequency. We recommend reading:

Emotional Cost

Although he assures that the federal processes "are not perfect," his presence in previous terrorism trials has shown him "very clearly" the difference compared to the case in Guantanamo, delayed by legal, logistical, national security issues, and the health of key witnesses. That slowness has taken an emotional toll on the survivors and families of the nearly 3,000 victims in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. "No one has been held accountable for 9/11. (Osama) Bin Laden was killed, but there were no judicial proceedings. No evidence was presented. No one has been formally found guilty yet," Kelly insisted. Deborah García, whose husband, David García, also died at the World Trade Center, took more than two decades to travel to the base and sit in the gallery at Camp Justice, where the previews resumed this week after months of pause. The next ones will not be held until next May. The journey here, he explained to EFE, has been as long as it has been painful.

Criticisms Against the Choice of Guantanamo

In 2023, he traveled to Guantanamo for the first time, where he has observed the proceedings on more than one occasion. Garcia was on the island when the decision was made to suspend the hearings due to the US government's attempts to close the case through plea agreements that would have avoided the death penalty, an initiative that later failed. In his opinion, the chosen venue is part of what is not working in the process that, in his opinion, should be held on US territory. "It gives the impression that the US Government is putting up obstacles," he said. "I feel a little less hopeful that there will actually be some kind of trial," she indicated, while adding that "at first I was in favor of the death penalty" but changed her mind because she later understood that a capital punishment can take decades.

Without a Closure Almost 25 Years Later

Retired U.S. Army Colonel John Grote, injured in the 9/11 Pentagon attack, has been traveling to the island for over a decade and admits that not even in his "wildest dreams" would he have imagined that almost a quarter of a century later, the case would still be in the preliminary phase. He insisted to EFE that he values the effort to demonstrate that his country is not "barbaric" and defends the rule of law, although he complained about the "snail's pace" with which the process moves, largely due to the problems of classifying information about the accused. Grote said he felt frustrated by what he sees as a defense strategy to "throw sand in the gears and slow things down," but said he understands that, for a defense attorney, every day his client is still alive "is a victory." You can also read: «I do not anticipate that these four individuals will ever leave the bay», whether by sentence, age or natural causes, he warned. For Grote, making people not forget 9/11 has become his "personal crusade" because "there are still families out there who are still suffering because of it."