Posted on 06/13/2006 5:54:28 AM PDT by Alama
Following accusations by terrorist prisoners of abuse and torture in American, British, Iraqi, Afghan, and Canadian prisons, lawyers for three tourists arrested on Friday and charged with trying to blow up St. Peters Basilica are alleging abuse at the hands of officials of the Roman Catholic Church. They also maintain that their clients are totally innocent.
“Doesn’t every Vatican tourist carry 40 kilos of C-4 around with them?” asked one perplexed barrister.
Another lawyer for the bearded, Southwest Asian looking men whose religion and region of birth have nothing whatsoever to do with their alleged crime said that the conditions of his client’s imprisonment were “unbearable.”
“It’s a disgrace,” said James “Slick” Burblehead, an attorney with the group Human Rights Travesty Monitoring Executive (HURTME). “Since there are no prisons in Vatican City, our clients have been incarcerated in furnished apartments in the Vatican with comfy chairs and soft beds. What self respecting alleged terrorist would be caught dead in such conditions of imprisonment?”
Burblehead alleges that the Vatican has failed to supply suitably gruesome conditions of incarceration which could lead to unbearable psychological stress on his client as he contemplates how his friends will laugh at him when he returns home. “His self-esteem will suffer unless he is placed in a dark cell with bars that he can rattle a tin cup across,” said Burblehead.
Among other outrages, Burblehead lists:
1. A private bathroom. “No reason to splash urine on the Koran unless someone can see it,” says the barrister.
2. Nuns serving meals. Burblehead points out that since the nuns wear habits that are about as revealing as the burqa clad women from home, there are no opportunities to allege immodesty on the part of female jailers, thus taking away a crucial defense talking point.
3. Internet access. Mr. Burblehead alleges that WiFi access is “spotty” and wonders if the Italians have ever even heard of broadband. “This is the Italian state telephone company we’re talking about here for God’s sake,” said Burblehead.
4. Food. The lawyer says that the food is just too good, preventing his client from going on a hunger strike. “He has become especially partial to certain Italian pasta dishes like Shrimp Papardelle,” said Burblehead. “How in God’s name can one expect to go on a hunger strike in Italy? In Rome, no less?”
Attorneys for the two other men charged in the same case are also alleging intolerable conditions for the clients with one barrister threatening to take their case to the United Nations.
“There is only one organization that can understand what our clients are experiencing,” said Tupak Sixpak, an attorney representing an alleged terrorist who was found with 16 sticks of dynamite and structural plans for St. Peters but who maintains he had nothing whatsoever to do with the plot. “Only the UN will appreciate our clients innocence and the unnecessarily abusive conditions of their incarceration.”
Mr. Sixpak likens the imprisonment of his client to the persecution of early Christian martyrs who endured unspeakable atrocities at the hands of Roman authorities nearly 2000 years ago.
“Not much has changed in 2000 years,” said Sixpak. “I can see the similarities between the way my client has been abused with the suffering of the early Christians. In fact, my client is a modern day martyr and should be released so that he can fulfill his lifelong dream of sacrificing his life for his cause.”
This line:
Another lawyer for the bearded, Southwest Asian looking men whose religion and region of birth have nothing whatsoever to do with their alleged crime...
is especially funny in light of the recent Canadian terror arrests. Simply classic!
I love it! "Tupak Sixpak" indeed! :))
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