Attorney General Eric Holder says self-proclaimed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other Guantanamo Bay detainees will be sent to New York for trial in a civilian federal court and he expects to seek the death penalty.
At a news conference Friday, the attorney general said five other suspects will be sent to military commissions.
Holder said the detainees in the New York case will be tried in a courthouse just blocks from where the Sept. 11 attackers felled the twin towers. Bringing such notorious suspects to U.S. soil to face trial is a key step in President Barack Obama's plan to close the terror suspect detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Obama initially planned to close the detention center by Jan. 22, but the administration is no longer expected to meet that deadline.
