In 2024, The Gateway Pundit reported that then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced the revocation of a plea deal previously reached with Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, the alleged mastermind behind the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, along with two of his co-conspirators, Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin Attash and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi.
This decision effectively reinstated the possibility of the death penalty for the trio.
The Gateway Pundit previously reported that the plea deal, reached between the Convening Authority for Military Commissions and the defendants and signed by retired Brig. Gen. Susan K. Escallier, was intended to ‘mitigate’ the legal repercussions for the accused while allowing them to avoid capital punishment.
On Friday, a federal appeals court upheld Austin’s decision to undo the plea deal.
A divided federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., on Friday tossed out an agreement that would have allowed 9/11 terror mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to plead guilty in another failed effort to end a years-long legal saga surrounding the military prosecution of men held at Guantánamo Bay.
The 2-1 D.C. Circuit appeals court decision upheld then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s decision to undo the plea deal approved by military lawyers and senior Pentagon staff.
The deal would have carried life without parole sentences for Mohammed and two co-defendants, potentially taking capital punishment off the table.
The original plea deal garnered outrage from various political factions and advocacy groups who argued that any leniency shown to those involved in the 9/11 attacks undermines justice for the nearly 3,000 victims and their families.
In making his decision, Austin wrote, “I have determined that, in light of the significance of the decision to enter into pre-trial agreements with the accused in the above-referenced case, responsibility for such a decision should rest with me as the superior convening authority under the Military Commissions Act of 2009.”
“Effective immediately, I hereby withdraw your authority in the above-referenced case to enter into a pre-trial agreement and reserve such authority to myself. Effective immediately, in the exercise of my authority, I hereby withdraw from the three pre-trial agreements that you signed on July 31, 2024 in the above-referenced case,” he added.
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