A U.S. military judge denied a request from self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed requested to hav internet access inside his Guantanamo cell. The judge ruled that he doesn’t need it to prepare for his death penalty trial. So his friends or family shouldn’t bother sending him a new Sony Vaio.
He is one of five defendants held at the Guantanamo Bay Navy base who’s charges include conspiracy, hijacking and terrorism for the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Those attacks killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.
The government was going to provide the men with laptop computers so they could review the evidence. Prosecutors argued at a pretrial hearing that giving them access to the internet could pose a severe security risk.
The men are held apart from the general population in a prison reserved for Guantanamo detainees transferred out of CIA custody.
The judge also rejected the inmates’ requests for office equipment such as printers and provisions to speak with their family members by telephone. He ruled the men are entitled to have additional resources installed on their laptops including a legal dictionary, the U.S. Constitution and the Geneva Conventions.
