Expert Witness Blog
UMass Dartmouth Professor Brian Glyn Williams has been called as a law and legal expert witness in the judicial proceedings to determine the legal status of Osama bin Laden’s driver, Salim Hamdan. Hamdan is being held as an “alien unlawful enemy combatant,” which denies him Geneva Convention rights as prisoner of war. Glyn’s role is to shed light on the military command structure of the Taliban and Al Qaida armies. “As an expert witness I was supposed to be above the fray, to shed some light and personal professional knowledge” into an area that he says is routinely oversimplified, he said. SouthCoastToday.com also reports:
Most people in government and the military, he said, “discovered this zone after 911. Their view is shaped by images of people falling out of buildings on 911,” he said. As a result they have a “reductionist approach” in which every Arab, every person connected with Al Qaida or the Taliban army is considered a terrorist. “If you were caught, you had something to do with 911,” he said.
Excerpted from UMD professor testifies as expert witness at trial of bin Laden’s driver, Steve Urbon, Standard-Times senior correspondent, December 30, 2007.