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Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani was arrested in July 2004 in Pakistan and transferred to the US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay (Cuba) in September 2006. He was charged with terrorism and war crimes (among other charges) in connection with the 1998 attacks on the US Embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. In June 2009, Ghailani became the first prisoner of Guantanamo Bay to be transferred to the United States for prosecution. On 17 November 2010, Ghailani was found guilty conspiring to destroy property and buildings of the United States and acquitted of all other charges.

Ghailani’s defense lawyers filed a motion for a judgment of acquittal, or in the alternative, for a new trial, arguing that in the light of the acquittals, it was inconsistent to enter a finding of guilt with respect to one count.

The District Court disagreed, finding that there is no requirement of consistency of verdicts. It also rejected the argument in the alternative, holding that the conviction was not a manifest injustice (which could give rise to a new trial).

Reynaldo Bignone, born in 1928, was the de facto president of Argentina from 1982 to 1983 and the last dictator to hold power in the country. As such, he was appointed by the military junta and sought to impose amnesty laws for perpetrators of gross human rights violations before transferring power to the democratically elected Raul Alfonsin. Nevertheless, in 2005 the Argentinean Supreme Court overturned these amnesties and opened the way for prosecutions of those involved in the country’s 1976-1983 “Dirty War”. Since then, Reynaldo Bignone was charged and convicted of crimes against humanity in several trials on the basis of his involvement in the Dirty War. 

In the current appeals case, the life sentence of Bignone and three other accused for their involvement in the illegal deprivation of liberty, torture and the murder of Diego Muniz Barreto and Juan José Fernández, was affirmed.

Two men, Mr. Nader Elhuzayel and Mr. Muhanad Badawi, were found guilty by a jury of conspiring to support the Islamic State on 21 June 2016 after earlier pleading not guilty. In particular, Mr. Elhuzayel, who was arrested prior to boarding a flight to Israel via Turkey at Los Angeles International Airport, was found to have encouraged others to support and join the Islamic State, and to have vowed to travel to Syria to fight for the terrorist group himself. Both were also convicted of financial fraud charges, the proceeds of which were used to fund the travel. A decision with regard to sentencing is anticipated later this year.