Here is a new development in Nayyar Zaidi’s case.
Nayyar Zaidi, locked up in some federal prison in Ohio awaiting trial, appeared before Judge Kathleen McDonald O’Mailly on August 26 for a hearing following a motion he had moved requesting that he be allowed self-representation as he wished not to be represented by his court-appointed lawyer, Craig Weintraub. The judge told him that she would approve his request only after a competency test to determine if he was competent to plead his case himself. She also said his competency to stand trial would need to be determined.
Irshad Salim adds:
Zaidi said he is “alarmed†by the judge’s verdict because in case the psychiatric test he is administered finds him not competent to stand trial, he could be committed “for life” to a psychiatric detention facility until it is determined that he is fit to undergo trial. That could mean a lifetime, Zaidi said.
The competency test is part of the due process of U.S law for those individuals who wished to defend themselves in court.
Zaidi thinks it should not be meant for someone like himself, a highly educated man and one of Pakistan’s best known journalists and broadcasters who has been associated with the Jang Group of Publications for over 30 years.
It is possible that this latest development may suggest that the prosecution’s case against him– crossing state lines with the intention of committing a felony involving an underage female – is weak, said one observer.
Zaidi has written to his home state Virginia’s Senator including some others as well as to Virginia Governor. He has also appealed for help from CPJ, ACLU, PFUJ and wishes that U.S. correspondents and U.S Senators be informed by the media about his predicament.
Nayyar Zaidi is detained since March 2008 in an Ohio jail and has been refused bail.
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