attack on a U.S.-bound airliner a reading of his Miranda right to an
attorney without consulting Blair’s office, the Homeland Security
secretary and other officials.
Blair noted that the administration has created a
special team for interrogating high-value terrorism suspects and that
it was not used — but should have been — after the arrest of Umar
Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of attempting to take down
the
“That unit was created exactly for this purpose,” Blair told the
“We did not invoke the HIG in this case. We should have. Frankly, we
were thinking more of overseas people. And, duh … the decision was
made on the scene.”
Sen.
“We know that those interrogations can provide
critical intelligence,” she said. “But the protections afforded by our
civil justice system … encourage terrorists to lawyer up. I’m told
that with Abdulmutallab, once he was Mirandized and received civilian
lawyers, that is exactly what he did. He stopped answering questions.”
HIG refers to high-value interrogation group, an elite team made up of experts from the
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