When we learned that David Iglesias — one of the US Attorneys purged by the Bush administration for political reasons — is going to be prosecuting Guantanamo detainees as a member of the Navy JAG corps, it struck us that he appeared to have been on the job for a little while. That would suggest he was tapped for the assignment by the Bushies — which would be ironic given his past.
Turns out that’s not exactly the case. Iglesias told TPMmuckraker that he had responded to an email sent out by the Navy JAG corps, looking for prosecutors for the assignment. His application was eventually approved, he said, by that office and by the Office of Military Commissions, which is run by Susan Crawford — the retired general who last week told the Washington Post unequivocally that we tortured Mohammed al- Qahtani, a Gitmo detainee.
In other words, it appears that it was the uniformed military, rather than the civilian DOD, that brought Iglesias on board.
As for the value of his new work, Iglesias said: “It’s important for people to have confidence in what’s going on, in light of all the problems the office has had over the years” — which have included allegations of rigged prosecutions.
And he called the new leadership under Defense Secretary Bob Gates “fantastic,” adding “they get it.”