Message #209700

[Scavenger]

Pressed further on that point, Holder said: "The possibility of catching him alive is infinitesimal. He will be killed by us or he will be killed by his own people so he can't be captured by us."

Much of the hearing centered around the Obama administration's stalled plan to put the Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the professed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on trial. Last year, Holder announced the trial would take place in federal civilian court in New York City, not far from the site of the destroyed World Trade Center.

In the face of resistance from New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other local politicians, that plan was shelved and the White House is now considering putting KSM and four alleged co-conspirators into a military commission trial.

Rep. Chaka Fattah, D-Pa., bemoaned what he called a "cowardly" desire to avoid a civilian terror trial in a major city.

If a terrorist had killed thousands of Philadelphians, Fattah said, "we would expect him to come to Philadelphia" to face trial "if he would live long enough."

"It doesn't befit a great nation to hesitate or equivocate on the question of following our own laws," he said.

In other testimony:

_ Holder defended the interrogation of the suspect in the attempted Christmas bombing of an airliner at it approached Detroit. He said the questioning produced very valuable intelligence and disputed the notion that reading the suspect his Miranda rights prevented further intelligence-gathering. The suspect resumed cooperating later, officials have said.

Holder's remarks led to an angry exchange with Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., who claimed "there was an opportunity that was missed and we will never get it back again."

Holder shot back: "That is simply not true."

_ The attorney general also acknowledged an ongoing probe into whether defense teams representing Guantanamo Bay detainees may have wrongly obtained photographs of CIA interrogators – pictures that could, some fear, endanger those interrogators.

_ Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., offered support for Holder's now-dormant plan to try the Sept. 11 suspects in New York. But Serrano himself acknowledged he was the only elected New York official who still supported the idea.

"I thought it was very dramatic to say I'm not afraid of you'" to the terrorists, Serrano said.