🚀 go-pugleaf

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/165638_yee20.html

The U.S. Army dropped all charges against Capt. James Yee yesterday, ending 
a six-month ordeal in which the former Fort Lewis chaplain had been branded 
a possible traitor and was charged with a range of accusations including 
mishandling documents and viewing pornography on his computer.

Yee's backers said the formal dismissal vindicates their contention that 
the former chaplain at a Guantanamo Bay detention center for suspected 
terrorists was targeted because of his Chinese heritage -- and his Muslim 
faith.

In dismissing the charges, Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, commander of Joint 
Task Force Guantanamo, which operates the detention center, cited "national 
security concerns that would arise from the release of the evidence" if the 
case proceeded.

"In the grand scheme of things, and in the interest of national security, 
General Miller felt like the charges needed to be dropped," said Lt. Col. 
Bill Costello, a spokesman for the U.S. Southern Command. "It seemed to be 
the prudent way to proceed."

But Yee's attorney, Washington, D.C., lawyer Eugene Fidell, said he 
couldn't understand the military's shadowy explanation.

"I wouldn't begin to speculate about that," said Fidell. "I do think their 
explanation doesn't wash."

Fidell said instead that the allegations may have been prompted in part by 
heightened post-Sept. 11 concerns about Muslim terrorists and their alleged 
American supporters.

"People were working on a hair-trigger, and allowed some stereotyping to 
come into the picture," he said.

Yee's Seattle-area supporters were more blunt.

"This very much proves to us that (the federal government is) 
hyper-sensitive in profiling Muslims," said Samia El-Moslimany, an official 
with the Seattle chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.