Military judge sets trial for alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed

A military judge set a trial date for the alleged mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, for June 2028.Mohammed was charged in 2008 and has been awaiting trial since his arrest in 2003. The former al Qaeda propaganda chief has been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba for 20 years, first arriving in 2006 after being held at various CIA “black sites,” and has been charged with war crimes stemming from the 2001 terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.He will be prosecuted alongside other alleged conspirators, Walid bin Attash, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, and Mustafa Ahmed al Hawsawi. A military commissions judge, Air Force Lt. Col. Michael Schrama, declined a January 2027 start date for the trial proposed by prosecutors, instead pushing it to the following summer. The trial comes after a possible agreement that would have spared Mohammed the death penalty in exchange for a guilty plea was thrown out.Mohammed’s defense has blamed the long wait for a trial on what they allege is a U.S. government effort to bury details of torture against detainees held at CIA black sites before their transfer to the Cuban detention camp, with a 2014 Senate report, known as the “CIA Torture Report,” finding that Mohammed was subjected to waterboarding, torture that simulates drowning, 183 times. Other alleged conspirators were also tortured, the report found.JUDGE SUSPENDS CHARGES FOR GUNMAN ARRESTED AT TRUMP’S CALIFORNIA GOLF COURSEThe Kuwaiti-born Mohammed is accused of masterminding the plot that saw two hijacked airliners crash into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, both of which would collapse that morning, as well as the Pentagon. A fourth airliner, whose hijackers were about to be overtaken by passengers on the flight, crashed into a field in Pennsylvania. Its intended target, based on findings from the 9/11 Commission, was the Capitol in Washington.The attacks killed 2,977 people, and even more have died from health-related illnesses in the decades since, according to federally established health programs. The attacks also represent the greatest single-day loss of life for New York’s police and fire departments.