Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri

Who is Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri?

Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri is a citizen of Qatar who is serving a 15-year sentence in a United States federal prison, with credit for the nearly eight years he was held in detention without charges. He pleaded guilty to one count in a plea bargain after his case was transferred in 2009 to the federal court system.

Al-Marri was a graduate student at Bradley University and a legal resident of the United States when arrested in December 2001 in Illinois by the federal government. Two years later he was indicted on charges of credit card fraud but in 2003, he was classified as an enemy combatant and transferred to military custody. He was detained for six years at the Naval Consolidated Brig at Charleston, South Carolina in solitary confinement. He is the only non-citizen known to have been held as an enemy combatant within the continental United States since the September 11 attacks.

In Al-Marri v. Wright, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals determined that, as a legal resident arrested in the United States, he was entitled to contest his detention in federal court. It ruled that he needed to be charged and tried, or released. The Supreme Court agreed to certiorari.