The Guardian 18 June, 2008
Court ratifies condemnation of The Five
On June 4, 2008, a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, ratified the guilty verdicts against the five Cuban anti-terrorists imprisoned in the United States since 1998, and annulled the sentences of three of them who will be newly sentenced in Miami.
The panel ratified the sentences of René González (15 years) and Gerardo Hernández (two life sentences plus 15 years). In the latter case the decision of the panel was two to one. In a 16-page opinion Judge Phyllis Kravitch affirmed that the government did not present sufficient evidence to find Hernández guilty of the charge of conspiracy to commit murder.
The cases of Ramón Labañino (life imprisonment plus 18 years), Fernando González (19 years) and Antonio Guerrero (life imprisonment plus 10 years) were sent for resentencing to the judge of the Florida Court.
It will be Judge Joan Lenard who will call a hearing to issue the next decision. It was Lenard who gave the disproportionate sentences against the Five in 2001.
The 99-page decision of the Atlanta Court decided that the defence appeal arguments referring to the charges are "meritless". The language of this decision was more political than legal and explicitly mirrored the government’s position.
The decision was handed down at a time when the US government is manipulating to protect the international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles by refusing either to extradite him to Venezuela, from whence he fled when he was tried for destroying a civilian aeroplane in full flight, or to try him in the United States; thus violating the International Conventions against terrorism.
Nor is it possible to ignore the decision in the context of the US election, where the topic of Cuba acquires particular relevance in the state of Florida.
Judge Pryor wrote the opinion in the name of the three judges. In 2007, Pryor was designated by President George W Bush, through an arrangement negotiated by today’s Republican Party candidate John McCain, after the Senate had rejected Pryor’s appointment. This was denounced at the time by important US media, including the Atlanta Journal Constitution and The Washington Post, given the known ultra-rightwing positions of this judge.