Boumediene v. US and Johnson v. Eisentrager specifically analyzed the habeas corpus rights of non-American citizen enemy combatants being held outside of the United States. Our judiciary is based on stare decisis and precedent, so a lower court must look to see how the Supreme Court has ruled in the past to determine how to rule in this situation.

 

Within the time allotted for filing a response to the habeas corpus petition, the U.S. Army, with the assistance of the Department of Justice, filed a motion to dismiss the habeas corpus petition. How should the district court decide regarding Akbar's habeas corpus petition?

 

The primary inquiry concerns Akbar's habeas corpus petition, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Should the District of Columbia carefully consider the petition's merits and the legal arguments presented by both parties?

 

In 2025, the President finally took action to close the Guantanamo Bay prison. He achieved this by releasing some prisoners, transferring other prisoners to prisons within their native countries, and not admitting any new prisoners captured in Iraq, Syria, Venezuela, or Afghanistan. Some of these new prisoners went to such "resorts" as Abu Ghraib in Iraq, while others went to Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan and Balad Air Base in Iraq, controlled by U.S. military forces. One of the prisoners at Balad Air Base, Ali Hussein Akbar, a Jordanian citizen, mailed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.  

 

In his petition, Mr. Akbar claimed that he was imprisoned as an "enemy combatant" six months prior but that the U.S. military had not to date filed formal charges against him, the military had not allowed him to answer any charges, the army had not given him the assistance of counsel, and the military had not given him a hearing before a neutral tribunal to determine the truth or falsity of the filed charges.