The announcement that six detainees in Guantanamo would be charged and tried for the September 11, 2001 attacks was welcomed by a number of parties, including the families of people who died on September 11. However, some would like to see a trial in New York and not in Gitmo.
The Sun found some different reactions. Jim Riches a fire chief whose son died in the World Trade Center, said, "[T]hese people should be brought to New York where the crime was committed and where the families could go and see the trial and see them face justice." Congressman Anthony Weiner said, "if holding this trial in the city eases the heartache of a single person, then we should do it."
However, another parent of a firefighter who died in the attacks, Sally Regenhard, believes the Pentagon's pursuit of death sentences is important: "If these people are indeed guilty as charged, I'd like them to receive the same death sentence that our children received." But a lawyer for the Human Rights Watch, Jennifer Daksal, raised concerns over abuse during interrogations and the trials' "unfairness" to the NY Times, "The American public doesn’t need to put them on trial at this point to prove we got the bad guys."
An editorial in the Sun suggests that the "lack of a death penalty in the state" is what prompted the Defense Department to hold the trial in Guatanamo Bay. The Daily News' editorial thinks "death is too good," ending the column with "Die, you bastards."
Photograph of Guatanamo Bay prison by Brennan Linsley/AP
