Sept. 11 Judge to Decide Whether Guantánamo Plea Deals Are Valid

GUANTÁNAMO BAY, Cuba — The military judge in the Sept. 11 case authorized lawyers Wednesday to investigate whether Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin lawfully rescinded a plea agreement with the man accused of planning the attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and two accused accomplices.

In doing so, Col. Matthew McCall, the judge, declined a request by Mohammed’s lawyer to rule narrowly on whether Austin breached a lawful contract and, if so, hold a hearing this week on his plea.

The long-running case was thrown into confusion last week after a senior Pentagon official who oversees the military commissions signed an agreement with the three defendants to resolve the case with lifetime sentences — then, two days later, Austin rescinded it. Austin said they should face a death-penalty trial.

McCall ordered briefings on the question of whether there was unlawful influence in the case in time for the next round of hearings, starting Sept. 16, days after the 23rd anniversary of the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people. The plea agreements remain under seal as case evidence.

He also instructed the government to swiftly comply with requests by defense lawyers for information about the circumstances surrounding Austin’s decision.

“Everybody must follow the rules, including the secretary of defense,” McCall said. “I’m not going to rush,” he said, pledging not to be affected “if more political pressure is put on the parties.”

The lead prosecutor, Clayton Trivett, who had negotiated the deal, said his team considered Austin’s order revoking the plea agreement to be valid. But he asked the judge to “freeze the litigation in place” — make no rulings, take no evidence — for a broader consultation because the U.S. government’s position was “not fully articulated.”

The judge declined and went forward with hearing testimony from Robert McFadden, a retired agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, who investigated al-Qaida in the early 2000s. Before the plea deals, the court was engaged in a multiyear examination of whether the case was tainted by the torture of the detainees in CIA custody and by secret collaboration between the CIA and FBI in gathering evidence.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times .