9/11 Case Suffers Major Blow As Judge Bars Khalid Shaikh Mohammed’s FBI Confessions

· Free Press Journal

Washington, August 29, 2026: In a major setback for the US case against Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, a military judge has ruled that his confessions to FBI agents cannot be used at his trial because prosecutors failed to prove that the statements were voluntary. Mohammed is accused of masterminding the September 11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon.

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The ruling could have serious consequences for a death-penalty case that has remained stuck in pretrial proceedings since the defendants were arraigned in 2012. It could also further delay a trial that is already scheduled to begin on June 5, 2028, particularly if prosecutors appeal against the decision, The New York Times reports.

Torture Casts A Long Shadow

The central issue is what happened to Mohammed before FBI agents questioned him at the US Navy base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, in 2007. He was captured in 2003 and brutally interrogated by the CIA in secret overseas prisons before being transferred to Guantánamo in 2006.

Those interrogations included 183 rounds of waterboarding. Prosecutors had already excluded statements Mohammed made during those interrogations from the case. But military judge Lt Col Michael Schrama went further, ruling that Mohammed's later statements to FBI agents in 2007 were also inadmissible.

“The prosecution has failed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that Mr. Mohammad’s statements to the F.B.I. were voluntarily given,” Schrama wrote in the conclusion of his 45-page ruling.

The ruling was not immediately released to the public, but several lawyers who had seen it confirmed its unclassified contents.

Schrama cited several factors, including what he described as an “unbroken continuation of the C.I.A.’s psychological conditioning and severe coercion” when Mohammed was questioned at Guantánamo in 2007.

The judge also found that FBI agents intentionally failed to explicitly tell Mohammed that he had the right to remain silent and consult a lawyer, and that his statements could be used against him at trial.

A Crucial Piece Of Evidence Lost

Prosecutors have described Mohammed's 2007 interrogations at Guantánamo as the government's most crucial evidence in the long-running case.

The decision to exclude them therefore strikes at the heart of the prosecution's case and underlines how the methods used to interrogate Mohammed years earlier continue to shape the legal proceedings.

Defence lawyers had argued that CIA torture, combined with years of isolation and solitary confinement, had conditioned Mohammed to later tell FBI agents what they wanted to hear. He was not allowed to consult a lawyer until long after he had confessed and was charged.

Mohammed's lawyer Gary Sowards said the decision “serves as a civics lesson for why the government shouldn’t engage in such shameful conduct”.

Chief prosecutor Rear Adm Aaron C Rugh said his team would review the ruling “and will make a decision on whether to appeal in the near future”.

Prosecutors have five days to decide whether to appeal and can seek another five days.

Case Could Face Another Delay

An appeal could further delay the start of a trial already more than a decade in the making. The timing is particularly significant because the ruling comes just before the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Ageing survivors and relatives of victims have expressed concern that they may never see a final resolution of the case.

Without Mohammed's confessions, prosecutors would have to rely on documents, telephone intercepts and transcripts of other conversations to put him on trial. Some of that evidence is also being contested.

The ruling does not, however, mean Mohammed would necessarily be released if he is not tried or convicted. Under Guantánamo's detention doctrine, the United States maintains that it can hold him indefinitely as part of its war against terrorism.

The trial is intended to set out how 19 hijackers from the Middle East reached the United States and carried out the deadliest terrorist attack on US soil. Mohammed is accused of conceiving the plan in the 1990s, presenting it to Osama bin Laden and helping select and train the hijackers.

Other Confessions Under Scrutiny

Schrama has yet to decide whether confessions made by two other defendants in the September 11 case, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, can be admitted.

An earlier judge, Col Matthew McCall, excluded the confessions of Mohammed's nephew Ammar al-Baluchi, who is accused of helping some of the hijackers with their finances and travel arrangements.

Similar questions have arisen in another Guantánamo case. Col Lanny Acosta suppressed the confession of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the defendant in the USS Cole bombing case, explicitly finding that he had been tortured by the CIA.

Al-Nashiri's death-penalty trial over the 2000 attack, in which 17 US sailors were killed, is scheduled to begin in October.

A Case Still Stuck In Pretrial Hearings

The September 11 case has been mired in pretrial proceedings since arraignment in 2012. Four other judges have gathered evidence over the years on the question Schrama has now decided.

Another defendant, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, was earlier found mentally incompetent to stand trial. His lawyer blamed his condition on torture.

Also Watch:

9/11 Mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed To Face Trial In 2028, Nearly 27 Years After Attacks

The latest ruling highlights the fundamental problem that has followed the September 11 prosecution for years: evidence gathered after coercive interrogations can remain legally vulnerable long after those interrogations have ended.

For the families waiting for a trial, that leaves an uncomfortable reality. Nearly 25 years after the attacks, the legal battle over how the suspects were treated continues to complicate efforts to determine their guilt in court.

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