The Trial of Jose Padilla. Oh Stop Please

This for now, more presently.


MIAMI, May 18 -- Somewhere in Kandahar Afghanistan, shortly after the U.S. invasion in the fall of 2001, a man driving a Toyota twin-cab pickup pulled up at a CIA post to deliver thousands of pages of documents.

The five-page "Mujahideen Identification Form" -- basically a personnel application form -- was partially completed in Arabic by Padilla in July 2000 and is a key piece of evidence, prosecutors said.

A U.S. fingerprint expert testified that a 2006 analysis identified Padilla's fingerprints on the front of the first page of the form and on the back of the last page.

Defense attorneys have questioned why Padilla's prints do not appear on the middle pages of the application form. They have suggested that the prints' locations are consistent with Padilla being handed the form during his detention, and not opening it. More