ABSTRACT
September 11 burned into America’s collective memory perhaps even more vividly than December 7, 1941, and has evoked a natural demand both for security and for retribution. Al Qaeda, its allies, and its adherents have continued to carry out terrorist crimes, killing innocent civilians, not only in the US, but elsewhere around the globe. Such widespread and systematic murder of innocent civilians constitutes not only a domestic crime but also an international one. Given the existing statutory and judicial authority for capital punishment, the US has had to confront the issue whether to seek the death penalty against the perpetrators of these attacks. Meting out the death penalty to international terrorists involves difficult moral, legal, and policy questions. The magnitude of these crimes, including the killing of nearly 3,000 innocent people on 9/11, cries out for redress.
