A Legal Loose Cannon

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Moussaoui, 37, a French Moroccan who was detained about a month before the 9/11 attacks, has pleaded guilty to conspiring with al-Qaeda to hijack planes, but denies direct involvement in the 9/11 plot, claiming that he was preparing for a future attack instead. If he is not executed, he faces life imprisonment. Prosecutors were counting on the witnesses barred by Brinkema to explain to jurors how airport security could have been increased had Moussaoui come clean with FBI agents who interrogated him before 9/11.

In the end, prosecutors managed to persuade the judge to let them present to the jury a new set of aviation experts who have had no contact with Martin. But the case for executing Moussaoui remains tenuous. Legal experts, and even Brinkema, have questioned whether prosecutors are overreaching in arguing that he should be put to death for what he did not do. Martin, in one of her e-mails, said she doubted that airport screeners could have detected all the short-blade knives the hijackers took aboard, even if Moussaoui had told agents before 9/11 what he knew. Of course, that is an opinion that prosecutors wish she had kept to herself.