President Donald Trump admitted today the complications of transferring to Guantanamo the alleged terrorist who killed eight people on Tuesday in a multiple hit in New York, a day after saying he was considering sending him to that prison.
“I would love to send the terrorist from New York to Guantanamo, but statistically that process takes much longer than going through the federal system,” Trump said on his Twitter account.
In addition, the president said it would be “appropriate” to keep the alleged perpetrator of the attack, the Uzbek immigrant Sayfullo Saipov, “in the country of the horrible crime he committed.”
After the multiple hit in Manhattan, considered the worst attack in New York since the attacks of September 11, 2001, Trump said Wednesday that he planned to consider sending the suspect to the prison in Guantanamo (Cuba).
“Send it (to the suspect) to Guantánamo, I would definitely consider it,” the president said, describing the alleged terrorist as “animal” when asked about by a journalist.
No one detained on US soil has ever been sent to the Guantanamo prison, located in a naval base in Cuba, and since 2008 no alleged terrorist captured abroad has been transferred there.
Former President Barack Obama (2009-2017) promised to close Guantánamo as soon as he came to power and, although he could not keep his promise, managed to reduce the prison population from 242 to 41 prisoners with the transfer of almost two hundred individuals to third countries.
During the electoral campaign, Trump was opposed to the releases of Guantanamo prisoners and, in addition, promised to maintain and expand that prison to fill it, in his words, of “bad guys”.
On the other hand and as he did last night in a tweet, Trump insisted today again on requesting the death penalty for the alleged terrorist in New York, who has shown no remorse for his actions and that, according to investigators, perpetrated the attack on behalf of the jihadist group Islamic State (IS).
“Death penalty,” the president wrote in capital letters on Twitter.
Although the state of New York does not contemplate capital punishment in its criminal system, which has life imprisonment as the maximum punishment, Saipov could receive a death sentence in a federal trial for terrorism.
However, some experts have already warned that Trump’s tweets about the death penalty for the suspect can complicate the work of prosecutors and be used by the defense to question the guarantees of a fair trial.
