The Biden administration on Tuesday asked a federal appeals court to block a plea agreement for accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and two co-defendants that would spare them the risk of the death penalty.
The Justice Department argued in a brief filed with a federal appeals court in the District of Columbia that the government would be irreparably harmed if the guilty pleas were accepted. It said the government would be denied a chance for a public trial and the opportunity to “seek capital punishment against three men charged with a heinous act of mass murder that caused the death of thousands of people and shocked the nation and the world.”
