A truth teller who deserves justice
Ex-Navy officer Matthew Diaz gambled everything to uphold the rights of prisoners at Guantánamo. Now he may lose his law license.
By Joe Conason
April 4, 2008 | A former Navy officer named Matthew Diaz came to Washington, D.C., on Thursday, eating lunch just a few miles from the Pentagon and only steps from the White House -- those mighty institutions whose imperial will he defied by upholding the legal rights of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where he served as a deputy legal counsel.
During the winter of 2005, sometime after he realized that the government was ignoring the landmark Supreme Court decision affording counsel and due process to every alleged terrorist in the military prison, Lt. Cmdr. Diaz printed out and mailed all of their names to civil rights attorneys in New York. That act ultimately resulted in his imprisonment in the Navy brig in Charleston, S.C., and the forfeiture of his military job and pension, and may yet lead to the permanent loss of his license to practice law.
But Diaz had come to the nation's capital on April 3 to be praised, not buried -- as this year's winner of the Ridenhour Prize for Truth-Telling, which is named after the late soldier and journalist who exposed the My Lai massacre in Vietnam 40 years ago this month. Sponsored by the Fertel Foundation and the Nation Institute (where I serve as director of a fund supporting investigative journalism), the Ridenhour prize recognizes the bravery of whistle-blowers who uphold American values regardless of personal risk.
The Diaz story is extraordinary, yet profoundly and typically American. Having risen from poverty and tragedy to professional status and prestige through his own hard work, he gambled everything on a principle, and lost.
He grew up in a broken family, moved frequently as a child and often survived on food stamps. His father, a hospital nurse convicted of the sensational serial murders of a dozen patients, ended up on death row in California's San Quentin prison when Matthew was a teenager. He soon dropped out of high school and joined the Army.
Whatever damage his early life inflicted on him, however, it did not destroy his intelligence and ambition, and eventually he obtained an associate's degree in law enforcement, a bachelor's in criminology and, after leaving the Army, a law degree while working for the Postal Service. He joined the Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps and was sent to Guantánamo during the summer of 2004, in part because of his outstanding service record at his previous posts. By then he had been promoted to lieutenant commander and was expecting to move up again soon. The superior officer who evaluated him before he left for Cuba had described him as "the consummate naval officer" and "a stellar leader of unquestionable integrity."
more...
http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2008/04/04/diaz_gitmo/
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
