For Prosecution of Bush War Crimes, Planning Begins (with video)

For prosecution of Bush war crimes, planning beginsStephen C. Webster
Published: Monday September 15, 2008

Watch Bugliosi's opening statement to a July, 2008 House Judiciary Committee hearing on the limits of executive authority:


On Saturday morning in Andover, Massachusetts, as about 120 activists, adademics, constitutional scholars, public officials and legal experts gathered in the Wyndham hotel, the building suddenly went dark.

Electricity had been cut off just prior to the start of a landmark war crimes conference, the goal of which was to plan the prosecution of Bush Administration officials. The first of its kind conference, already featuring a laundry-list of notable speakers, was suddenly in flux ... If only for a few moments.

"We were already so effective, the government tried to shut us down," said conference organizer Lawrence Velvel, dean of the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, in an interview with RAW STORY.

"Of course, when I said that at the conference opener, the power had been restored. I was only joking," said Velvel with a slightly nervous laugh. "A fuse box fried, but the local electric company fixed it before we even began."

The 'Bush war crimes conference,' according to its organizers, is a "throwback to the framers of the constitution," which aims to establish "necessary organizational structures" to pursue those guilty of war crimes "to the ends of the Earth."

"The framers didn't trust the federal government either," said Velvel. "And oddly enough, over the years and decades, a strong distrust of government was once a Republican position. It was, at least, in theory. And then Bush came along and there's this, well, my country, love it or leave it in the GOP ... But now, you have people on the other side of the spectrum taking that very position.

"This is a conservative idea, to hold conferences and then take action to take power. Liberalism has been made fun of as mere self expression. I was very impressed by the desire in this group to take action."

"This is not a campaign event," said Professor Christopher Pyle of Mt. Holyoke College, during his speech to the conference. "It is a conference about how to restore governmental accountability in the wake of a criminal administration. It addresses the most serious crisis in our nation’s history -- the claim that the president and his secret agents can get away with torture, kidnapping, and even manslaughter."

The two day affair was divided in half: Speakers on Saturday, and planning on Sunday.

Chief among the academics, legal experts and whistle-blowers speaking in Andover was Vincent Bugliosi, best known for successfully prosecuting Charles Manson and penning the subsequent novel, Helter Skelter. His new book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder, is currently available at retail.

Other speakers included:


# Phillippe Sands, Professor of Law and Director of the Centre of International Courts and Tribunals at University College, London. He is the author of "Torture Team: Rumsfeld's Memo and the Betrayal of American Values" (Penguin/Palgrave Macmillan), among other works.


# Jordan Paust, Professor of Law at the University of Houston and author of "Beyond The Law."


# Ann Wright, a former U.S. Army colonel and U.S. Foreign Service official who holds a State Department Award for Heroism and who taught the Geneva Conventions and the Law of Land Warfare at the Special Warfare Center at Ft. Bragg, N.C. She is the coauthor of "Dissent: Voices of Conscience."


# Peter Weiss, Vice President of the Center For Constitutional Rights, which was recently involved with war crimes complaints filed in Germany and France against former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others.


# Benjamin Davis, Associate Professor at the University of Toledo College of Law and former American Legal Counsel for the Secretariat of the International Court of Arbitration.


# David Lindorff, journalist and co-author with Barbara Olshansky of "The Case for Impeachment: Legal Arguments for Removing President George W. Bush from Office"(St. Martin’s Press).


# Colleen Costello of Human Rights USA.


# Christopher Pyle, a professor at Mt. Holyoke and author of several books on international matters

VIEW VIDEO AT:
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/War_crimes_conference_plans_prosecution_of_0915.html