{"id":52902,"date":"2016-09-30T11:27:00","date_gmt":"2016-09-30T16:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/content.findlaw-admin.com\/ability-legal\/supreme\/legal-commentary\/saddams-justice.html"},"modified":"2016-09-30T11:27:00","modified_gmt":"2016-09-30T16:27:00","slug":"saddams-justice","status":"publish","type":"supreme","link":"https:\/\/supreme.findlaw.com\/legal-commentary\/saddams-justice.html","title":{"rendered":"Saddam’s Justice"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Saddam’s Justice<\/h1><\/td>\n <\/tr>\n

By JOANNE MARINER<\/h2><\/a><\/td>\n <\/tr>\n

Wednesday, Jan. 03, 2007<\/td>\n\n <\/tr>\n <\/table>\n

President Bush’s statement in reaction to Saddam Hussein’s execution was categorical: “Saddam Hussein was executed after receiving a fair trial — the kind of justice he denied the victims of his brutal regime.”<\/p>

But as with so many other claims Bush has made in recent years, this one stretches the facts. While it is true that Hussein’s prosecution was far better than the justice he provided his victims — who rarely got any legal process at all — that does not mean that it was fair.<\/p> \n\n

Saddam Hussein’s trial was deeply flawed, and the court’s precipitous review of his appeal was inexcusable. Perhaps worst of all was the way he was put to death, which seemed more like lynching than a legal execution.<\/p>

Even those who feel no sorrow for Hussein may worry about what the proceedings mean for the future of Iraq. In retrospect, the prosecution will likely be viewed as a set-back for human rights and the rule of law. It was the showcase trial for the new Iraq, and it was a failure.<\/p>

The Trial<\/b><\/p>

Saddam Hussein was responsible for a massive series of atrocities, including the killing of more than 100,000 Kurds in northern Iraq as part of the 1998 Anfal campaign. Yet the crimes for which he was executed were of a much smaller scale and they took place much further in the past.<\/p>

What made the 1982 killing of 148 men and boys from the town of Dujail so important was a single factor: the victims were Shiites.<\/p>

The trial proceeding before the Iraqi High Tribunal were marred from the start, both in narrow procedural terms and as part of a broader context. Human Rights Watch, which published a 97-page report<\/a> on the trial, documented a series of serious shortcomings in the government’s conduct of the proceedings. They included:<\/p>