U.S. & World News

WASHINGTON (CBS News) ― Self-proclaimed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other Guantanamo Bay detainees will be sent to New York to face trial in a civilian federal court, the Justice Department said today.

They are currently charged before military commissions with conspiring to commit the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people.

"After eight years of delay, those allegedly responsible for the attacks of September the 11th will finally face justice," Attorney General Eric Holder said this morning. "They will be brought to New York to answer to their alleged crimes in a courthouse just blocks away from where the Twin Towers once stood."

The cases have been jointly assigned to prosecutors from the Southern District of New York and the Eastern District of Virginia, with the trial held in New York City.

Holder said the cases will be prosecuted "vigorously," and that the maximum punishment would be sought.

"These were extraordinary crimes, and so we will seek maximum penalties," he said. "Federal rules allow us to seek the death penalty for capital offenses and while we'll review the evidence and circumstances following established protocols, I fully expect to direct prosecutors to seek the death penalty against each of the alleged 9/11 conspirators."

In addition to Mohammed, the other defendants are Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin 'Attash, Ramzi Binalshibh, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi.

Holder also announced that the prosecutions of five other Guantanamo Bay detainees, accused of orchestrating the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, which killed 17 U.S. sailors and injured dozens of others, and of participating in an al Qaeda plot to blow up oil tankers in the Straits of Hormuz, will be tried by military commissions.

Hodler said recent Congressional reform to the Military Commissions Act would ensure that those trials will be fair and that convictions obtained will be secure.

• Read Holder's Announcement Of Decision To Prosecute 9/11 Conspirators

At a joint news conference in Tokyo with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, President Barack Obama said the determination of seeking charges in a civilian court or military court was legal and national security matter, but said, "I am absolutely convinced that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be subjected to the most exacting demands of justice."

Bringing such notorious suspects to U.S. soil to face trial is a key step in President Barack Obama's plan to close the terror suspect detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Mr. Obama initially planned to close the detention center by Jan. 22, but the administration is no longer expected to meet that deadline.

It is also a major legal and political test of Mr. Obama's overall approach to terrorism. If the case suffers legal setbacks, the administration will face second-guessing from those who never wanted it in a civilian courtroom. And if lawmakers get upset about notorious terrorists being brought to their home regions, they may fight back against other parts of Mr. Obama's agenda.

"This is not a huge surprise. There have been hints that the attorney general was leaning in this direction but it's a huge departure from the strategy and tactics of the Bush administration, which had tried and failed to get Mohammed tried by the military," writes CBS News chief legal analyst Andrew Cohen.

The New York case may also force the court system to confront a host of difficult legal issues surrounding counter-terrorism programs begun after the 2001 attacks, including the harsh interrogation techniques once used on some of the suspects while in CIA custody. The most severe method - waterboarding, or simulated drowning - was used on Mohammed 183 times in 2003, before the practice was banned.

"The decision is a vote of confidence in the federal courts and in civilian prosecutors and there are still some safeguards in place to ensure that Mohammed doesn't turn the trial into a religious or political showpiece. There also are ways in which the feds can protect their classified information and still use it at trial," says Cohen.

It was not immediately clear where commission-bound detainees like al-Nashiri might be sent, but a military brig in South Carolina has been high on the list of considered sites.

The actual transfer of the detainees from Guantanamo to New York isn't expected to happen for many more weeks because formal charges have not been filed against most of them.

The attorney general has decided the case of the five Sept. 11 suspects should be handled by prosecutors working in the Southern District of New York, which has held a number of major terrorism trials in recent decades at a courthouse in lower Manhattan, just blocks from where the World Trade Center towers once stood.

Holder had been considering other possible trial locations, including Virginia, Washington, DC, and a different courthouse in New York City. Those districts could all end up conducting trials of other Guantanamo detainees sent to federal court later on.

The attorney general's decision in these cases comes just before a Monday deadline for the government to decide how to proceed against 10 detainees facing military commissions.

In the military system, the five Sept. 11 suspects had faced the death penalty, but the official would not say if the Justice Department would also seek capital punishment against the men once they are in the federal system.

The administration has already sent one Guantanamo detainee, Ahmed Ghailani, to New York to face trial, but chose not to seek death in that case.

At the last major trial of al Qaeda suspects held at that courthouse in 2001, prosecutors did seek death for some of the defendants.

Mohammed already has an outstanding terror indictment against him in New York, for an unsuccessful plot called "Bojinka" to simultaneously take down multiple airliners over the Pacific Ocean in the 1990's.

Some members of Congress have fought any effort to bring Guantanamo Bay detainees to trial in the United States, saying it would be too dangerous for nearby civilians. The Obama administration has defended the planned trials, saying many terrorists have been safely tried, convicted, and imprisoned in the United States, including the 1993 World Trade Center bomber, Ramzi Yousef.

Mohammed and the four others - Waleed bin Attash, Ramzi Binalshibh, Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi and Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali - are accused of orchestrating the attacks that killed 2,973 people on Sept. 11, 2001.

Mohammed admitted to interrogators that he was the mastermind of the attacks - he allegedly proposed the concept to Osama bin Laden as early as 1996, obtained funding for the attacks from bin Laden, oversaw the operation and trained the hijackers in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The charges against the others are:

• Bin Attash, a Yemeni, allegedly ran an al Qaeda training camp in Logar, Afghanistan, where two of the 19 hijackers were trained. Bin Attash is believed to have been bin Laden's bodyguard. Authorities say bin Laden selected him as a hijacker, but he was prevented from participating when he was briefly detained in Yemen in early 2001.

• Binalshibh, a Yemeni, allegedly helped find flight schools for the hijackers, helped them enter the United States and assisted with financing the operation. He allegedly was selected to be a hijacker and made a "martyr video" in preparation for the operation, but was unable to get a U.S. visa. He also is believed to be a lead operative for a foiled plot to crash aircraft into London's Heathrow Airport.

• Ali allegedly helped nine of the hijackers travel to the United States and sent them $120,000 for expenses and flight training. He is believed to have served as a key lieutenant to Mohammed in Pakistan. He was born in Pakistan and raised in Kuwait.

• Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi, a Saudi, allegedly helped the hijackers with money, western clothing, traveler's checks and credit cards. Al-Hawsawi testified in the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, saying he had seen Moussaoui at an al Qaeda guesthouse in Kandahar, Afghanistan, in early 2001, but was never introduced to him or conducted operations with him.

(© 2010 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

Curious & Controversial News

• Boulder Topless Gardener Causes A Stir
• Woman Bites Off Man's Ear At Restaurant
• Sex.Com Domain Too Hot To Be Sold
• Anger Over MTV's Giant Phallus Stunt
• DNA From Germs May Solve Crimes Someday
• Beware The Botnet On Your PC
• Video Extra: Colorado's Weirdest Nugget
• Slideshow: Colorado's Weirdest Festival
• Slideshow: Colorado's Weirdest Crime
• Slideshow: Colorado's Weirdest House