* United States v. Abu Ali (4th Cir. Feb. 1, 2011)
As you may recall, Abu Ali originally was convicted on charges stemming from involvement with an al Qaeda cell in Saudi Arabia (including a plot to assassinate the President) and lost on his appeal of that conviction. The government had cross-appealed his original thirty-year sentence and prevailed, with the court on remand imposing a life sentence. In a per curiam, unpublished opinion released on Tuesday, a Fourth Circuit panel (Traxler, Wilkinson, and Motz) has now affirmed that life sentence.
By Robert M. Chesney
Robert M. Chesney is Charles I. Francis Professor in Law at UT-Austin School of Law. Chesney is a national security law specialist, with a particular interest in problems associated with terrorism. Professor Chesney recently served in the Justice Department in connection with the Detainee Policy Task Force created by Executive Order 13493. He is a member of the Advisory Committee of the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Law and National Security, a senior editor for the Journal of National Security Law & Policy, an associate member of the Intelligence Science Board, a non-resident senior fellow of the Brookings Institution, a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a member of the American Law Institute. Professor Chesney has published extensively on topics ranging from detention and prosecution in the counterterrorism context to the states secrets privilege. He served previously as chair of the Section on National Security Law of the Association of American Law Schools and as editor of the National Security Law Report (published by the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Law and National Security). His upcoming projects include two books under contract with Oxford University Press, one concerning the evolution of detention law and policy and the other examining the judicial role in national security affairs.
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