On March 23, 2006, Simpson Thacher - together with the Center for Social Justice at Seton Hall University School of Law, and Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP - filed a Supreme Court amici curiae brief in Qassim v. Bush, No. 05-892, on behalf of more than 300 detainees incarcerated at the United States Naval Station at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
Simpson Thacher, together with the Center for Constitutional Rights, acts as pro bono counsel to two Saudi detainees at Guantánamo, in connection with their petitions for writs of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. In December 2005, the District Court denied habeas petitions brought by two Chinese detainees at Guantánamo, Abu Bakker Qassim and Adel Abdu’ Al-Hakim, despite a concession by the United States government that they are “no longer enemy combatants,” and the District Court’s finding that they are thus detained unlawfully at Guantánamo. Citing the grave constitutional issues at stake, Qassim and Al-Hakim filed a petition for certiorari before judgment, and Simpson Thacher, Seton Hall and Orrick filed the amici curiae brief in support of this petition.
Specifically, amici argue that the District Court’s decision undermines the Supreme Court’s decision in Rasul v. Bush, 542 U.S. 466 (2004), which established that individuals imprisoned at Guantánamo can challenge the legality of their detention through habeas corpus in the federal courts. Amici call for the Supreme Court’s immediate intervention, arguing that further delay in implementing Rasul will perpetuate the system of brutality and lawlessness that threatens the lives and denigrates the humanity of many detainees at Guantánamo - several of whom, in the words of Rasul, may be “wholly innocent of wrongdoing.”
Paul Curnin, Karen Abravanel and Veronica Vela worked on the detainees’ amici brief. Mark Stein and Nik Kolodny are also involved in the underlying representation.
To read the amici curiae brief download PDF.