June 3, 2026 • 12 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The talk station.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Hey thirty one fifty five care see de talk station.
Love this time of the week. Get to hear from
Judge Annapolitano. Judging Freedom is his podcast, follow him where
you get your podcasts. We'll deal with his subject matter
for on today's Judging Freedom late at the end of
the segment, as we always do, but in the meantime,
welcome back, Judge Edna Polatano. Always a pleasure of having
you on the program, and it was with great horror
(00:24):
I read your column Gitmo and Torture revisited, sort of
a painful to deal with recap of the fifteenth year
of the prosecution of colleague Shaik Muhammed and going into this, Judge,
it's kind of my response to you, and my emails suggested.
You know, I know there are people out in the
world because I've talked to so many of them. Screw
that guy. He's a terrorist, he hates America. I don't
(00:46):
care what they did to him. He deserves whatever he got.
But it's bigger and more more important than that. And
who among us would not say whatever our torturers wanted
us to say if we were being subjected to the
kind of violence this man was subjected to I just
sign up to uninform whatever the look, Brian, this is
what we're going to do to you over the next
(01:06):
several years. If you don't tell us what we want
I find tell me what you want me to tell you,
I'll sign. That's what happens with torture. I mean, apostle
Peter denied Jesus Christ three times. They didn't even torture him.
He just knew his life was in jeopardy because of
the Romans.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
The ex CIA agents and other government officials who have
participated in and orchestrated torture, as well as some of
the psychologists who have devised it, have said the exact
same thing that you did. After a while, the victim
tells the tortures whatever he or she thinks they want
(01:45):
to hear, and it often doesn't correspond with reality. In
this case, the torture went on for three years, and
then there were admissions. Then there was in Guantanamo Bay
a second set of interrogators who did not torture FBI,
as well as military and US intelligence, and again there
(02:08):
were admissions. So the argument is, was his personal will
so attenuated, was his fear of the power of interrogators
so extraordinary that he would tell the second set what
he thought they wanted to hear. That's the issue before
this judge. The whole prosecution is a serious stain on
(02:32):
the American judicial system because Lindsey Graham talked George W.
Bush into making this a military prosecution. If this had
been a criminal prosecution in Lower Manhattan, in Federal Court,
which is the principal place where the attacks occurred, where
the world trade towers were, this case would have been
resolved many, many years ago. But here we are fifteen
(02:54):
years of litigation, five judges, forty four thousand pages of
documents for the newest judge to review, and no trial
date set yet where he's on his sixth set of prosecutors.
I mean, this is just a monstrosity from the point
(03:15):
of view of American justice. And I understand the argument
of your great listeners, who have such antipathy towards anybody
that would do what he admitted to doing. But if
you allow the government the slightest opening, if you allow
the government to get away with torture and denying due
(03:38):
process in one instance, they'll drive a truck through it,
and you never know who that truck will.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Hit right going back to you know again, if I
was arrested by some government who headed out for me
and let me just put ourselves in the end, the
situation of maybe a January sixth protester, Oh, they weren't
pre they were just doing whatever. The point being, a
lot of them got arrested, a lot of them. People
feel that they were ill treated. But if they subjected
the January sixth protester to this type of torture, which
(04:09):
I think needs to be explained, because the original torture,
as you boy, as you as you explained, waterboard one
hundred and eighty three times, hung by his wrist while
naked in a well lit walk in refrigerator where he
was freezing and couldn't sleep for days, head smashed repeatedly
against wooden walls, his rectum through which he was fed
so brutalized that he bled for months, often ingesting into
(04:32):
his intestines, his own blood and fecal material. That's round one.
And then they bring about and they say, well, you're
gonna get round two unless you tell the judge that
you weren't tortured. Is that the setup for.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
This, Yes, you bet. It's a setup for this.
Speaker 3 (04:49):
It was so repellent that two sets of prosecutors ago,
not the current prosecutors, but their predecessors, initiated plead agreements.
The prosecutors said the defense Council, now that we know
everything that happened to this guy, we can't ethically defend
this in a public courtroom.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Or when we go back to the US, we.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Won't have our because this is happening in Cuba, we
won't have our licenses to practice law. So the government
initiates plea agreements. A plea agreement is entered into, it's
agreed to by defense Council, it's agreed to by the defendants.
It's agreed to by the prosecutors. It's agreed to by
the General and the Pentagon supervising all the prosecutions. There
(05:32):
are many prosecutions going on at Gitto. This is just
the most notorious one, and it's agreed to by the
trial judge. Then the Secretary of Defense says, I don't
agree fires the General who agreed. He withdraws the Pentagon's approval.
The trial judge says, too little, too late, Secretary of Austin.
The trial judge is reversed by an appellate court, which
(05:54):
says Austin has the final say.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
It's not too little, too late.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
The trial judge resigns, the prosecutors are resigned, A new
prosecutorial team comes in, a new trial judge comes in.
That judge spends a year reading forty four thousand pages
of documents.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
You can't make this up. Brian and announced.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
This week he's going to rule this summer on whether
the confession made to the second team of interrogators, the
ones that threatened a torture but didn't actually torture, can
be read to the jury.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Can That's where we.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Are in that particular hearing, and in considering that ruling
ken the court. Is the court going to be privy
to the torture he went through in the first round,
which certainly had an influence on this man in dealing
with the second inquiry because he knew what was coming
his way if he didn't concede.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
Yes, this trial judge before he can rule, has to
read everything. His predecessor is immediate predecessor, the one who
signed off on the guilty plea held hours and hours
of testimony from the defendants themselves, from government psychiatrists, and
from a defense psychiatrists.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
About the effect of torture.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
Even the government psychiatrists admitted that the effect of brutalizing
torture can be so extreme that the victim will tell
anybody from his cellmate to the person bringing him food,
to his wife on the phone, anybody what he thinks
they want to hear, because of the horrific fear of
(07:30):
going through the torture. Again, what's interesting here is the
second set of interrogators was led by an FBI agent
with thirty years experience. Did he read these people?
Speaker 1 (07:43):
They're Miranda warnings?
Speaker 3 (07:45):
He forgot now in a police station. That's the end
of it. It is you don't read the Miranda warnings.
No matter what the defendant says, that jury doesn't hear it.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
And none of this evidence would be interest in a
criminal court in the United States because it's you know
that old the way you boiled inn is like fruit
of the poisonous tree. You can't beat a confession out
of a person and have that confession be admissible, like
you can't kick in a door without a warrant, Grab
evidence and presented in court because it will be suppressed
because you violated the constitutional rights of the owner of
the home whose door you kicked in. None of those
(08:19):
would be admissible, meaning they wouldn't have a case.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
Correct, theoretically, the same laws are applying here. But you know,
military justice is to justices, military music is to music.
This is just taking forever, in part because of the
military procedure that no judge can stay for longer than
three years. It's time for him to get promoted or retired.
(08:45):
Great Lindsey Graham forgot to tell that to George Bush
when they set up this system.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
What a bizarre law. Of course, that sounds like something
was created in order to allow this to happen. It's
like people over at the CIA who won't produce documents
even though they've been ordered by law to produce them.
They wait around for another administration and then the issue
sort of goes away. Just wait for the next administration
and we won't have to deal with the problem we're
presented with right now. It's like waiting around. It's like
a battle of attrition three years for a judge in
(09:12):
a complex case like this, When it takes about three
years to get up to speed in order to even
hear the case, there's something fundamentally wrong with that, your honor, I'll.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
To make matters even worse. When the defendants told their
lawyers that they believed the torture was videotape, the defendants
subpoened the tapes.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
They disappeared, They disappeared.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
That never happens. That never happens, your honor. Nothing to
see here. So if you had to guess, I know
how Judge ended of Paulatano would rule in that case
if you're the military tribunal judge. But what do you
anticipate this judge is going to do in resolving this
just a tea leaf freeing ask, I think.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
He's going to suppress the evidence.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
And before your viewers start throwing eggs at the screen,
there is much evidence of his guilt lawfully obtained. The
government doesn't even need these confessions in order to convict,
but the government wants to use them just because that's
(10:18):
the way the government is.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Okay, And I appreciate you bringing that back up, because
that point serves as the predicate for why so many
people would say, well, screw this guy, he's a terrorist.
I don't care what they do to him. But again,
we're talking about torture here, and when you put it
out and beyond its confines. In this situation, any government
would do it like they play fast and lose with
everything anymore. We don't want this going on, so we
(10:41):
will figure out only fifteen years later to finally going
to get an answer to the question. Judgennapolitano, Judging Freedom
is your podcast. Who are you going to be speaking
with today?
Speaker 3 (10:50):
I have Aaron mante Pepe Escobar from the Saint Petersburg
Economic Forum in Saint Petersburg, Moscow, May Johnson who says
Pakistani intel told him Iran does have a new clear weapon.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Oh jeez, and uh and.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
Phil Giraldi complaining quite properly about Section two twenty four
of the National Defense Authorization Act, which would automatically give
Israeli officials access to American top secret information as a
matter of law. Oh did you know that that is
(11:31):
in the legislation?
Speaker 2 (11:33):
No, I did not, which is why I reacted exactly
the way I did. I'm in a state of disbelief
on that one. Judging and a Polaitano. We will listen
to Judging Freedom today. Find the podcast where you get
your podcasts, and tune in every Wednesday at eight thirty
Here on the fifty five Cars Morning Show and enjoy
the analysis from Judging and Apolitano. Have a great week,
my friend. I won't be around next week. I'm getting
my cancer treatment Thursday Friday. The next week, I'm going
(11:55):
to be recovering from chemo. I got chemo brain and
I just two weeks from today, Sir, I'll look
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Forward to the best, best of luck to you.
The talk station.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Hey thirty one fifty five care see de talk station.
Love this time of the week. Get to hear from
Judge Annapolitano. Judging Freedom is his podcast, follow him where
you get your podcasts. We'll deal with his subject matter
for on today's Judging Freedom late at the end of
the segment, as we always do, but in the meantime,
welcome back, Judge Edna Polatano. Always a pleasure of having
you on the program, and it was with great horror
(00:24):
I read your column Gitmo and Torture revisited, sort of
a painful to deal with recap of the fifteenth year
of the prosecution of colleague Shaik Muhammed and going into this, Judge,
it's kind of my response to you, and my emails suggested.
You know, I know there are people out in the
world because I've talked to so many of them. Screw
that guy. He's a terrorist, he hates America. I don't
(00:46):
care what they did to him. He deserves whatever he got.
But it's bigger and more more important than that. And
who among us would not say whatever our torturers wanted
us to say if we were being subjected to the
kind of violence this man was subjected to I just
sign up to uninform whatever the look, Brian, this is
what we're going to do to you over the next
(01:06):
several years. If you don't tell us what we want
I find tell me what you want me to tell you,
I'll sign. That's what happens with torture. I mean, apostle
Peter denied Jesus Christ three times. They didn't even torture him.
He just knew his life was in jeopardy because of
the Romans.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
The ex CIA agents and other government officials who have
participated in and orchestrated torture, as well as some of
the psychologists who have devised it, have said the exact
same thing that you did. After a while, the victim
tells the tortures whatever he or she thinks they want
(01:45):
to hear, and it often doesn't correspond with reality. In
this case, the torture went on for three years, and
then there were admissions. Then there was in Guantanamo Bay
a second set of interrogators who did not torture FBI,
as well as military and US intelligence, and again there
(02:08):
were admissions. So the argument is, was his personal will
so attenuated, was his fear of the power of interrogators
so extraordinary that he would tell the second set what
he thought they wanted to hear. That's the issue before
this judge. The whole prosecution is a serious stain on
(02:32):
the American judicial system because Lindsey Graham talked George W.
Bush into making this a military prosecution. If this had
been a criminal prosecution in Lower Manhattan, in Federal Court,
which is the principal place where the attacks occurred, where
the world trade towers were, this case would have been
resolved many, many years ago. But here we are fifteen
(02:54):
years of litigation, five judges, forty four thousand pages of
documents for the newest judge to review, and no trial
date set yet where he's on his sixth set of prosecutors.
I mean, this is just a monstrosity from the point
(03:15):
of view of American justice. And I understand the argument
of your great listeners, who have such antipathy towards anybody
that would do what he admitted to doing. But if
you allow the government the slightest opening, if you allow
the government to get away with torture and denying due
(03:38):
process in one instance, they'll drive a truck through it,
and you never know who that truck will.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Hit right going back to you know again, if I
was arrested by some government who headed out for me
and let me just put ourselves in the end, the
situation of maybe a January sixth protester, Oh, they weren't
pre they were just doing whatever. The point being, a
lot of them got arrested, a lot of them. People
feel that they were ill treated. But if they subjected
the January sixth protester to this type of torture, which
(04:09):
I think needs to be explained, because the original torture,
as you boy, as you as you explained, waterboard one
hundred and eighty three times, hung by his wrist while
naked in a well lit walk in refrigerator where he
was freezing and couldn't sleep for days, head smashed repeatedly
against wooden walls, his rectum through which he was fed
so brutalized that he bled for months, often ingesting into
(04:32):
his intestines, his own blood and fecal material. That's round one.
And then they bring about and they say, well, you're
gonna get round two unless you tell the judge that
you weren't tortured. Is that the setup for.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
This, Yes, you bet. It's a setup for this.
Speaker 3 (04:49):
It was so repellent that two sets of prosecutors ago,
not the current prosecutors, but their predecessors, initiated plead agreements.
The prosecutors said the defense Council, now that we know
everything that happened to this guy, we can't ethically defend
this in a public courtroom.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Or when we go back to the US, we.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Won't have our because this is happening in Cuba, we
won't have our licenses to practice law. So the government
initiates plea agreements. A plea agreement is entered into, it's
agreed to by defense Council, it's agreed to by the defendants.
It's agreed to by the prosecutors. It's agreed to by
the General and the Pentagon supervising all the prosecutions. There
(05:32):
are many prosecutions going on at Gitto. This is just
the most notorious one, and it's agreed to by the
trial judge. Then the Secretary of Defense says, I don't
agree fires the General who agreed. He withdraws the Pentagon's approval.
The trial judge says, too little, too late, Secretary of Austin.
The trial judge is reversed by an appellate court, which
(05:54):
says Austin has the final say.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
It's not too little, too late.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
The trial judge resigns, the prosecutors are resigned, A new
prosecutorial team comes in, a new trial judge comes in.
That judge spends a year reading forty four thousand pages
of documents.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
You can't make this up. Brian and announced.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
This week he's going to rule this summer on whether
the confession made to the second team of interrogators, the
ones that threatened a torture but didn't actually torture, can
be read to the jury.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Can That's where we.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Are in that particular hearing, and in considering that ruling
ken the court. Is the court going to be privy
to the torture he went through in the first round,
which certainly had an influence on this man in dealing
with the second inquiry because he knew what was coming
his way if he didn't concede.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
Yes, this trial judge before he can rule, has to
read everything. His predecessor is immediate predecessor, the one who
signed off on the guilty plea held hours and hours
of testimony from the defendants themselves, from government psychiatrists, and
from a defense psychiatrists.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
About the effect of torture.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
Even the government psychiatrists admitted that the effect of brutalizing
torture can be so extreme that the victim will tell
anybody from his cellmate to the person bringing him food,
to his wife on the phone, anybody what he thinks
they want to hear, because of the horrific fear of
(07:30):
going through the torture. Again, what's interesting here is the
second set of interrogators was led by an FBI agent
with thirty years experience. Did he read these people?
Speaker 1 (07:43):
They're Miranda warnings?
Speaker 3 (07:45):
He forgot now in a police station. That's the end
of it. It is you don't read the Miranda warnings.
No matter what the defendant says, that jury doesn't hear it.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
And none of this evidence would be interest in a
criminal court in the United States because it's you know
that old the way you boiled inn is like fruit
of the poisonous tree. You can't beat a confession out
of a person and have that confession be admissible, like
you can't kick in a door without a warrant, Grab
evidence and presented in court because it will be suppressed
because you violated the constitutional rights of the owner of
the home whose door you kicked in. None of those
(08:19):
would be admissible, meaning they wouldn't have a case.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
Correct, theoretically, the same laws are applying here. But you know,
military justice is to justices, military music is to music.
This is just taking forever, in part because of the
military procedure that no judge can stay for longer than
three years. It's time for him to get promoted or retired.
(08:45):
Great Lindsey Graham forgot to tell that to George Bush
when they set up this system.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
What a bizarre law. Of course, that sounds like something
was created in order to allow this to happen. It's
like people over at the CIA who won't produce documents
even though they've been ordered by law to produce them.
They wait around for another administration and then the issue
sort of goes away. Just wait for the next administration
and we won't have to deal with the problem we're
presented with right now. It's like waiting around. It's like
a battle of attrition three years for a judge in
(09:12):
a complex case like this, When it takes about three
years to get up to speed in order to even
hear the case, there's something fundamentally wrong with that, your honor, I'll.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
To make matters even worse. When the defendants told their
lawyers that they believed the torture was videotape, the defendants
subpoened the tapes.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
They disappeared, They disappeared.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
That never happens. That never happens, your honor. Nothing to
see here. So if you had to guess, I know
how Judge ended of Paulatano would rule in that case
if you're the military tribunal judge. But what do you
anticipate this judge is going to do in resolving this
just a tea leaf freeing ask, I think.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
He's going to suppress the evidence.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
And before your viewers start throwing eggs at the screen,
there is much evidence of his guilt lawfully obtained. The
government doesn't even need these confessions in order to convict,
but the government wants to use them just because that's
(10:18):
the way the government is.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Okay, And I appreciate you bringing that back up, because
that point serves as the predicate for why so many
people would say, well, screw this guy, he's a terrorist.
I don't care what they do to him. But again,
we're talking about torture here, and when you put it
out and beyond its confines. In this situation, any government
would do it like they play fast and lose with
everything anymore. We don't want this going on, so we
(10:41):
will figure out only fifteen years later to finally going
to get an answer to the question. Judgennapolitano, Judging Freedom
is your podcast. Who are you going to be speaking
with today?
Speaker 3 (10:50):
I have Aaron mante Pepe Escobar from the Saint Petersburg
Economic Forum in Saint Petersburg, Moscow, May Johnson who says
Pakistani intel told him Iran does have a new clear weapon.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Oh jeez, and uh and.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
Phil Giraldi complaining quite properly about Section two twenty four
of the National Defense Authorization Act, which would automatically give
Israeli officials access to American top secret information as a
matter of law. Oh did you know that that is
(11:31):
in the legislation?
Speaker 2 (11:33):
No, I did not, which is why I reacted exactly
the way I did. I'm in a state of disbelief
on that one. Judging and a Polaitano. We will listen
to Judging Freedom today. Find the podcast where you get
your podcasts, and tune in every Wednesday at eight thirty
Here on the fifty five Cars Morning Show and enjoy
the analysis from Judging and Apolitano. Have a great week,
my friend. I won't be around next week. I'm getting
my cancer treatment Thursday Friday. The next week, I'm going
(11:55):
to be recovering from chemo. I got chemo brain and
I just two weeks from today, Sir, I'll look
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Forward to the best, best of luck to you.
Brian Thomas News
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