But Rodney Smith was also interested in what Byron knew, saw, and heard. He was one of the journalists at Byron’s press conference at the Harvard Club. He had CNN run excerpts of the video of Ali Hussein being forced under water in a bathroom in some country somewhere in the world. Other networks, less willing to display brutal conduct by people who were obviously American, broadcast tamer portions of the video.
The full video, which clearly showed Andrew Hurd and Tom Nashatka in the room and managing the men who held and pushed Ali Hussein, had quickly made its way onto YouTube. It had achieved viral status. So had Byron Johnson. He appeared on the most of the Internet postings with his image and words as filmed when he introduced the video.
Rod had several times invited Byron to appear on his show for an interview. He was impressed by Byron’s steadiness, his handsome presence, that attractive combination of a classic WASP face and the black eyes of his Mexican mother. Byron had declined to do the on-camera interviews, but he had given Rod details about Simeon Black’s work and his own dealings with Ali Hussein, the man invisible to the outside world, and the hidden process of the criminal case.
Rod Smith, who had given his private cell phone number to Byron, immediately took the call. “Byron, how are you?”
“I have some news for you.”
“Yes?”
“Ali Hussein is gone.”
“As in?”
“The government has removed him from the country. It’s called extraordinary rendition.”
“How do you know that?”
“I went to see him. I was told he was no longer there. I called the prosecutor. In fact, I bypassed the people I’ve been dealing with and contacted the U.S. Attorney himself. And he told me that Ali had been returned to administrative detention.”
Rod Smith was an experienced journalist-there was a restrained edge of excitement in his tone. “Does anyone else know this?”
“No.”
“Can I get you to come up here?”
“This time, for sure. I am the lawyer for a man who has been made to disappear.”
“We can send a car down for you.”
“No, I’ll take that great limousine in the ground. I need to concentrate my thinking.”
“Get here, if you can, Byron, in an hour. You know where we are?”
“I know-Columbus Circle.”
“Check in with security. We’ll let them know.”
“Fair enough.”
“Byron, thanks for this.”
46
WIND-DRIVEN SNOW BLEW and wrapped itself in shawls around the slender, tall statute of Christopher Columbus. Mid-afternoon traffic, mainly yellow taxis, swirled continuously around the circle at the base of the statue. Byron, standing at the floor-to-ceiling window in the green room in the Time-Warner Building, waited calmly for the young intern to take him to the set. A television monitor was attached to the wall. Rod Smith was speaking. There were routine reports about explosions in Iraq, a stolen child in Florida. And a commercial for a credit card in which a strong young woman stood on the top of a very high rock pinnacle in a wasted landscape in the West.
Sipping lukewarm coffee as he waited, Byron recognized that he had traveled a long way since that desperate day, on the steps of the courthouse in Miami, when he had reacted to the live camera and the anxious, unfriendly reporters like the proverbial deer in the headlights, his awkward performance that Sandy Spencer once used to insult him. This morning, as the beautiful snow made New York a gracious postcard, he was assured and focused and at ease.
Another commercial was running when he entered the studio. Rod Smith, remaining seated because he was attached to a tiny microphone, reached out his hand. “Perfect timing,” he said.
A young woman placed a microphone with a clip on Byron’s lapel and draped a cord with an earpiece behind Byron’s shoulder. She fitted the earpiece to his right ear.
“We’ll have plenty of time with you,” Rod said. “Look into the hole of the camera when the red light glows above it. Don’t look at the red light above the hole. I’ll introduce you. For the rest of the interview, just look at my face as I ask and you answer. Not into the camera.”
Byron heard the count: five, four, three, two, one, go. Rod, in his vibrant voice and reading from a script scrolled on the screen of the camera, said, “Welcome back. Over the last six months we’ve been reporting on the case of Ali Hussein. He’s the Syrian national who lived in this country for a decade or so until he was arrested in Bonn not long after the Iraq invasion. He had worked, he said, as an accountant, a skill that made him, according to anti-terrorism officials and federal prosecutors, one of the so-called masters of finance for al-Qaeda. After years in detention, Hussein was brought to the U.S. for prosecution in a civilian court. At the time, the Attorney General said the administration wanted to show the world the integrity of the our justice system. And, to the shock of many, Hussein faces the death penalty.”
On a cue, Rod turned from the camera in front of him to face Byron. “Here with me on an exclusive basis is Hussein’s lawyer, Byron Carlos Johnson. He’s an Army veteran with a long and distinguished career as a trial lawyer. He has volunteered to represent Ali Hussein. Welcome to CNN, Mr. Johnson. We understand there have been some important new developments in the case.”
Gazing at Rod’s handsome face, Byron said, “There have been. Today I learned that my client has been removed from the prison in New York City where he has spent the last six months and sent out of the country. The prosecution, as I was told after I learned of his removal today, has been terminated on a claim that national security interests were impaired by continued prosecution. It is very disturbing that a defendant, any defendant, who faced a trial at which a jury could find him innocent has been deprived of that opportunity.”
“What were the national security concerns?”
“That is a mystery to me. It may be, however, that the video I released a week ago showing the torture-including waterboarding-of Mr. Hussein could require the government to disclose other information it wants to hide.”
“Questions have been raised about how authentic that video is.”
“There are no legitimate questions about that video. The man who is beaten and interrogated and pushed under water to the point of near death is Ali Hussein. I have seen him dozens of times. One of the other men in the tape is an American agent who has acted under the name Andrew Hurd. That person is a torturer.”
“How do you know that, Mr. Johnson?”
“The video tells me-tells us all-that he is. You see him on the tape ordering that unimaginable pain he inflicted on Ali Hussein.”
“And how do you know his name is Andrew Hurd?”
“He has confronted me at least once, and given me that name. And I have other pictures of the same person.”
“You’ve suggested that he doesn’t work alone.”
“Of course not. He’s worked with the lead prosecutor, Hal Rana, in order to steal confidential information from me; with Christina Rosario, a covert agent who was secretly assigned to become my assistant in this case; and with the news commentator Kimberly Smith.”
“Ms. Smith has appeared on CNN.”
“And on Fox and on NBC. I have photographs of her with the man in the video and with the covert agent who succeeded in working for me, gaining access to all the information I had about my client.”
“Is that Christina Rosario?”
“Like Andrew Hurd, she apparently had a real name and a fictional name. I never knew the real name. I knew her as Christina Rosario.”