Yesterday Mohammed Jawad, who was the focus of this months' cover story for TAP, returned home to Afghanistan. A minor when he was captured, Jawad spent nearly seven years locked up--and was subject to torture from both American and Afghan authorities. He was eventually granted habeas relief after the government failed to justify his detention to a federal judge.
I didn't post yesterday on his return because I was still waiting to hear back about the conditions of his travel--during his last court hearing, Jawad's defense lawyers, Lt. Col. David Frakt and Jonathan Hafetz, expressed concerns that Jawad might be hooded and shackled or otherwise mistreated on his trip home. There was also the possibility that he might be criminally indicted before he left, but that didn't pan out, possibly because the prosecution's case was based on testimony from witnesses who had been "financially compensated."
Major Eric Montalvo, who was a member of Jawad's civilian defense team, accompanied Jawad on his trip home--although Hafetz claims that it took some effort to get the Pentagon to agree to take a member of the defense team along (the DoD didn't respond to a request for comment on the matter). Montalvo said that Jawad was shackled during the flight, and had some sort of "eye restriction" but wasn't necessarily hooded. Montalvo added that the conditions were "protocol for 'prisoner' transport for the safety of the guards... [I] don't like it but [it's] hard to argue around."
Still, Montalvo says that with the euphoria of returning home and seeing his family after seven years of confinement, as well as the whirlwind experience of meeting several important Afghan figures including President Hamid Karzai, "what happened on the flight just hasn't been a priority."
-- A. Serwer
