Crooked in Canada

Whether you’re supporting Canadian insurgent and alleged terrorist Omar Khadr or not, it’s pretty hard not to admit to yourself that his lawyer Lieutenant-Commander William Kuebler is going out of his way to keep ‘his’ story front and center when it comes his defence of Khadr, who if it wasn’t for the fact Khadr was captured by the Americans in Afghanistan in the first place, would likely be a nobody, somebody sitting around with his thumb up his ass waiting for his big break. In other words Kuebler isn’t in [it] for Omar Khadr, he’s in [it] for himself.

Kuebler doesn’t care what happens to Khadr just as long as he makes a name for himself. He sees Khadr as his best chance at making a big enough name for himself so that when his “tour of duty” with the U.S. military is over, he might be able to attract attention from some big name law firms, perhaps even a partnership, unless of course Kuebler has his heart set on hanging his own shingle, which at the end of the day doesn’t really amount to big bucks, what with all the pro bono and bleeding heart shit a lawyer who strikes out on his own has to put out there.

Somehow I don’t think Kuebler is looking to hang his own shingle, and at the moment his only interest is making a name for himself, and he is using Omar Khadr to do that.

Lt.-Cmdr. Bill Kuebler is as fake as a three-dollar bill when it comes to his representation of the only Western detainee at Guantanamo Bay, a man whose family back in Canada still supports terrorism in one way, shape or form, whether they deny it or not.

I actually am beginning to find this whole “Omar Khadr” thing a little bit ridiculous, especially when it comes to those morons who actually support this guy and believe that he should be freed and allowed to return to Canada where in secret and with his family no doubt, his extreme ideologies and beliefs will be coveted once again.

Khadr is no more a changed person today than he was 6 plus years ago when he was taken down by American soldiers in an Afghani hot zone, a place Khadr chose to be with the only purpose on his mind being one to kill as many coalition soldiers as he could.

Khadr basically bit of more than he could chew back then as is evident by the fact that he was captured by the U.S. Army back in 2002.

From the moment Khadr was captured he has been paying the price for his actions, a price he knew he would have to pay if he was captured.  He still might pay an even bigger price if the Americans are successful with their prosecution of the kid who can be seen on videotape smiling and grinning away while he is making an improvised explosive device (IED), the kind of bomb that has killed quite a few Canadian soldiers to date. And to think there are Canadian citizens who actually Khadr. They’re definitely not Canadians I would ever speak highly of that’s for sure.

Khadr’s trial is set to begin next month with pre-trial hearings expected to begin the day before president-elect Barack Obama’s inauguration, Martin Luther King Day.

Khadr will appear before a military commission on January 19 which has Kuebler whining that out of an act of desperation to get the trial underway the prosecution is prepared to start the case on a national public holiday and through inauguration day. What Kuebler fails to mention is that if it wasn’t for his stalling tactics, the case would have gotten underway a long time ago, and if he is upset about the starting date of the pre-trial hearings it probably has more to do with his own issues about not being able to attend some social engagements on those two days than it does anything else.

Disguising his anger at not being able to attend social engagements because of pre-trial hearings for his client (a client who has been waiting for more than 6 years now to face justice) by calling the prosecution desperate is typical of a whimpering man like Kuebler, and quite immature.  He needs to grow up, and stop with the head games.

Then again Kuebler might come up with something else between now and January 19 to delay his client’s case again. He has become quite adept at doing that, but I could be wrong too.

Kuebler might be running out of stall tactics, I mean think about it, how many tricks can he possibly have left in his bag

His whining about the starting date of Khadr’s pre-trial hearings shows his own frustration and desperation with the case, and with that comes a loss of focus on meeting his client’s needs when it comes to giving his client the best possible defence. To date Kuebler has only demonstrated that he is capable of delaying the trial with motions he has mostly lost up to this point, that he knows how to whine. I don’t think the guy knows how to lawyer to be honest with you, that he is winging it in the hope that the case will just go away, but again I could be wrong.

Nevertheless he has been ineffective in defending a client who could very well spend the rest of his life in jail, and like I said in Crooked in Canada before, he is a detriment to his client.

The Khadr family should be more than a little concerned at the possibility that the lawyer defending their own flesh and blood, a Westerner no less, has gone out of his way to drag this case out longer than it had to be.  By the way, I wonder how the Khadr’s truly feel about a Westerner, an infidel according to their beliefs and values defending a family member. Isn’t that f**king hilarious, maybe even a little ironic? The Khadr family can’t possibly be happy about that, especially if as I expect Khadr loses his case and has to spend anymore time behind bars than he already has.

It isn’t looking too good for Omar either, at least in my opinion it isn’t, otherwise Kuebler wouldn’t be going out of his way to whine about the case and the way it is progressing time and time again. Kuebler sounds like a defeated man, and he has nobody to blame but himself.

He has totally dropped the ball on this case, choosing instead to play politics and the “human rights” card, which at the end of the day will have no bearing on whether Omar is found guilty of all or some of the charges he is facing anyway. He f**ked up and he and his chairs know it. He’s fighting a losing battle and anything he says to the media now is his way of compensating for that losing feeling.

Kuebler knows that Omar Khadr is going down and it is beginning to sink in that there is nothing he can do to save his sorry clients ass anymore.

I have always thought that a good lawyer would spend more time focusing on how he or she was going to present their client’s case instead focusing on painting their opponents out to be the bad guys all of the time, and I still think that, only Kuebler isn’t one of those good lawyers. He has spent way too much time playing games then he has spent preparing for his client’s defence. In fact given the motions he has brought forward since he has taken over this case, I don’t know where he could have found the time to present a winnable argument for his client when the time comes because he has spent an awful lot of time whining to the media all the about the prosecution and dynamics of this case and gained nothing to boot. All Kuebler has done for his client is whine to the media and fight losing battles in civil courts, and he is no further ahead today than he was when he first took the case. If anybody should be feeling desperate, it should be Kuebler.

Kuebler is a bit of a joke really, and so are his client’s supporters who seem to have forgotten that Khadr’s charges have nothing to do with his treatment in Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo Bay, if only because he committed the crimes he is accused before he was taken into captivity.

For whatever reason Khadr’s lawyers and his supporters seem to think that Khadr’s treatment while in custody is the issue going before the military court, when in fact Khadr’s treatment while in captivity has nothing to do with the charges he is facing, including one murder charge that may or may not be dropped or dismissed entirely.

What it boils down to for me is, that Kuebler should spend more time focusing on evidence related directly to the charges his client is facing, and less time focusing on evidence that has nothing to do with the crimes his client is accused of.

What happened in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo isn’t the issue in this court case, it’s what happened before he was captured, and Khadr’s defence team and his supporters need to come to grips with that fact.