Al Kandari Files Petition for Rehearing En Banc
Fayiz Mohammed Ahmed Al-Kandari has filed a petition for rehearing en banc with the D.C. Circuit Court in his case against the U.S. His singular question is whether the Federal Rules of Evidence apply to habeas corpus cases brought by Guantanamo detainees. The D.C.
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Fayiz Mohammed Ahmed Al-Kandari has filed a petition for rehearing en banc with the D.C. Circuit Court in his case against the U.S. His singular question is whether the Federal Rules of Evidence apply to habeas corpus cases brought by Guantanamo detainees. The D.C. Circuit decided his case earlier this month, after cancelling oral arguments.
Al Kandari concludes:
Al-Bihani and the panel decisions that followed it, including the one in this case, are wrong. If the District Court's jurisdiction comes from 28 U.S.C. § 2241, as it must, then Fed. R. Evid. 1101(e) necessarily applies. If and only if hearsay satisfies the requirements of one or more of the exceptions in Fed. R. Evid. 803-807, it is indisputably admissable. If the law is to be changed to allow hearsay not falling within any exception, that change must come from Congress, or from the Supreme Court acting in its rulemaking capacity, not from this Court acting on its own policy preferences. Accordingly, this Court should reverse the panel decision and rule en banc that the district court exercised its jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 and that the Federal Rules of Evidence therefore apply to these habeas proceedings.You can read D.C. Circuit Judges Brett Kavanaugh, Laurence Silberman, and Douglas Ginsburg's opinion here.
Raffaela Wakeman is a Senior Director at In-Q-Tel. She started her career at the Brookings Institution, where she spent five years conducting research on national security, election reform, and Congress. During this time she was also the Associate Editor of Lawfare. From there, Raffaela practiced law at the U.S. Department of Defense for four years, advising her clients on privacy and surveillance law, cybersecurity, and foreign liaison relationships. She departed DoD in 2019 to join the Majority Staff of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, where she oversaw the Intelligence Community’s science and technology portfolios, cybersecurity, and surveillance activities. She left HPSCI in May 2021 to join IQT.
Raffaela received her BS and MS in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2009 and her law degree from Georgetown University Law Center in 2015, where she was recognized for her commitment to public service with the Joyce Chiang Memorial Award. While at the Department of Defense, she was the inaugural recipient of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s General Counsel Award for exhibiting the highest standards of leadership, professional conduct, and integrity.
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