Lawyers for Saddam Hussein took their case to Washington late Friday in an attempt to spare the condemned Iraqi dictator from the gallows, but their efforts were unsuccessful.
U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said U.S. courts do not have jurisdiction to interfere in another country’s judicial process. The ruling could have been appealed, but it was issued within an hour of the time Iraqi officials said they expected the execution to be carried out.
Hussein was handed over to his Iraqi executioners and walked to the gallows. In one final moment of defiance, Hussein refused to have a hood pulled over his head before facing the same fate he was accused of inflicting on countless thousands during a quarter-century of ruthless power.
The emergency motion filed by Hussein’s lawyers in U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia asked for a restraining order that would prevent the U.S. from handing Hussein over to Iraqi authorities for execution.
“Applicant Hussein is seeking an immediate, temporary stay of execution until further order of the court because the execution of Saddam Hussein now appears to be scheduled in the next 24 to 48 hours,” the motion states. It claims that executing the toppled tyrant will deprive him of his due process rights to respond to a civil suit filed against him in Washington.
Hussein, 69, was tried and convicted under Iraqi law for the 1982 massacre of 148 residents of the northern Iraqi city of Dujail. Hussein ordered the slaughter to avenge an assassination attempt.
Hundreds of thousands were imprisoned, tortured and killed under Hussein’s reign. Some human rights groups had hoped at least to postpone Hussein’s execution until a fuller audit of his crimes against humanity to could be catalogued.
