Al Bahlul v. United States (Al Bahlul II)
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
792 F.3d 1 (2015)
Relevant factsFree
Al Bahlul (defendant), an al-Qaeda member detained at Guantanamo, was convicted by a military commission of inchoate conspiracy to commit war crimes, even though the government conceded that conspiracy alone is not a recognized violation of the international law of war. He argued military commissions may only try genuine international war crimes and that trying him for a purely domestic-law offense violated Article III's vesting of judicial power in civilian courts.
IssueFree
Whether Congress may permit military commissions to try enemy combatants for non-international law-of-war offenses, such as inchoate conspiracy.