United States v. Mohamed Jawad is one of the military commissions

Guantanamo military commission

The Guantanamo military commissions are military tribunals created by the Military Commissions Act of 2006 for prosecuting detainees held in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps.- History :...

 convened under the authority of the Military Commissions Act of 2006

Military Commissions Act of 2006

The United States Military Commissions Act of 2006, also known as HR-6166, was an Act of Congress signed by President George W. Bush on October 17, 2006. Drafted in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision on Hamdan v...

.

Mohamed Jawad

Mohamed Jawad

Mohamed Jawad, born in Miranshah, Pakistan, was accused of attempted murder before a Guantanamo military commission on charges that he threw a grenade at a passing American convoy on December 17, 2002. Jawad's family says that he was 12 years old at the time of his detention in 2002...

 was an Afghan

Afghanistan

Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

 youth who was alleged to have participated in a grenade attack in Khost

Khost

Khost or Khowst is a city in eastern Afghanistan. It is the capital of Khost province, which is a mountainous region near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan...

, Afghanistan, on December 17, 2002.
Although American official asserted that bone scans had established that Jawad was over eighteen when he was transferred to Guantanamo, in 2003, Afghan human rights

Human rights

Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

 workers have argued that Jawad was only twelve or thirteen when the incident occurred.

Jawad's testimony before his Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Jawad testified before his Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Combatant Status Review Tribunal

The Combatant Status Review Tribunals were a set of tribunals for confirming whether detainees held by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp had been correctly designated as "enemy combatants". The CSRTs were established July 7, 2004 by order of U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense...

 in the fall of 2004.
Jawad testified that he was living with his uncle, when he was approached at the mosque, by men who offered him a good paying job—clearing land-mines in Afghanistan

Afghanistan

Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

. However, when he arrived at the camp in Afghanistan where he was told he was to be trained to clear land-mines, he was instead drugged, and was told to carry objects in his pocket, and led to a bazaar in Khost

Khost

Khost or Khowst is a city in eastern Afghanistan. It is the capital of Khost province, which is a mountainous region near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan...

. He testified he was told to wait by those who led the expedition. He testified he remembered hearing a distant explosion. He testified that while still feeling intoxicated he decided to buy some raisins from a food stall in the bazaar, and in order to do so he had to remove the objects from his pockets, only to be told by the stall owner that they were bombs, and that he should rush to throw them in the nearby river. He testified he followed the merchant's instructions and was running down the street, telling people to get out of his way because he had a bomb, when he was captured.

Charges drafted

Charges were drafted in October 2007.
Jawad was charged with "Attempted Murder in Violation of the Law of War" and "Intentionally Causing Serious Bodily Injury".

Concerns over torture and abusive interrogation

Darrel Vandeveld, the military attorney initially assigned to prosecute Jawad, has described being initially skeptical of accounts that Jawad had been subjected to abusive interrogation. He became convinced that Jawad had been subjected to serious abuse and he then worked to get the charges against Jawad dropped, and to have him repatriated to a rehabilitation program in Afghanistan. This prompted his superiors to order him to undergo a psychological assessment. Vandeveld eventually resigned and spoke out against the commission system.

After Vandeveld's resignation documents emerged that confirmed that Jawad had been subjected to the controversial Guantanamo "frequent flyer"

Frequent flyer program (Guantanamo)

The frequent flyer program is a controversial technique used by the USA in the Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba.Guards deprived detainees of sleep by moving them from one cell to another, multiple times a day, for days or weeks on end....

 sleep deprivation

Sleep deprivation

Sleep deprivation is the condition of not having enough sleep; it can be either chronic or acute. A chronic sleep-restricted state can cause fatigue, daytime sleepiness, clumsiness and weight loss or weight gain. It adversely affects the brain and cognitive function. Few studies have compared the...

 program.

Stephen R. Henley

Stephen R. Henley

Colonel Stephen R. Henley is an American lawyer and an officer in the United States Army.He is notable for having been appointed the President of a Guantanamo military commission.-President of a Guantanamo military commission:...

, the Presiding Officer over Jawad's Commission ruled that Jawad had been tortured, while in Afghan custody, and that confessions he made when he was transferred to US custody were inadmissible due to the recent torture, as were admissions made following the use of sleep deprivation.
The newly appointed Prosecutor appealed Henley's ruling to the Court of Military Commission Review.