Khaled Tashkandi
Okaz/Saudi Gazette
JEDDAH — Saudi student Khalid Al-Dossary, who is serving life sentence in Marion federal prison in Illinois, US, has appealed for assistance to repatriate him to the Kingdom on grounds that he sustained physical injuries as a result of torture by American jail wardens.
Okaz/Saudi Gazette received a document issued by Marion prison authorities confirming Al-Dossary’s request.
The Saudi prisoner has urged US authorities to give him all his rights and return to him his personal belongings, which they seized before his arrest in 2011.
The documents seized included papers related to his engineering project, study material and a video tape, the Saudi said, adding that these documents contained evidence that would prove his innocence.
His uncle Turki Al-Dossary told Okaz/Saudi Gazette that prison authorities have prevented Al-Dossary’s relatives from meeting him saying he does not want to meet them, without giving any proof for their claim.
He said defense lawyers had failed to produce adequate evidence to prove Al-Dossary’s innocence. “As a result the case moved in the wrong direction,” Turki Al-Dossary said.
Khalid’s family has appointed another team of lawyers specialized in such cases. They thanked the Foreign Ministry and Saudi Ambassador in Washington Prince Abdullah Bin Faisal Bin Turki for their support and care.
“The ambassador received us in the best manner and promised his support to prove Khalid’s innocence and protect his legal rights,” said the uncle.
Saud Bin Quwaid, Khalid’s lawyer, said prison authorities were putting obstacles before him to meet his client. “Until now the Saudi Embassy has not approved the defense team appointed by Khalid’s family despite the Foreign Ministry’s instruction to endorse the team in order for Khalid to get quick legal protection,” he pointed out.
Reem Zain, a British lawyer based in Bahrain, has been working with the legal team. She said she had tried several times to contact Khalid but prison authorities declined her permission. “This shows that the prison authorities wanted to hide evidence that would prove Khalid was tortured by them,” she said.
The prison authorities have been preventing Khalid’s family from meeting him and denying his legal rights, Zain said. She is now collecting 100,000 signatures to demand Khalid’s right to get the case reviewed and the verdict issued against him revoked. If she succeeds to collect that number of signatures she would be able to raise the issue with the governor of Illinois and even the US president to review the case.
Khaled Al-Thubaiti, a representative of the previous defense team refused to answer questions from Okaz/Saudi Gazette on his team’s failure to defend Khalid and the reasons for sentencing him to life imprisonment. “I don’t want to comment because it will affect the case,” Al-Thubaiti said.
Okaz/Saudi Gazette contacted Jay Walton, a senior prison official in Illinois, who said: “There is no objection in contacting Khalid Al-Dossary by telephone.” However he pointed out the prisoner should show interest to take the phone call as per law. “You can also contact prisoners through social media websites,” Walton said.
Okaz/Saudi Gazette tried to register with a website to call Khalid but it does not accept the registration of international numbers. When asked Walton about alternatives, he said: “In this case you have to send a lawyer to coordinate international phone calls and visits.”
