I'm not going to call them *detainees* because these people have been PRISONERS. Without any type of due process, without being able to face their accusers, tortured, and in kangaroo court military trials.  It's actually disturbing to me that it has taken this long just to arrive at this point. Meanwhile, people who may or may not have been guilty have been languishing in prison. This is not Soviet Russia.

The Supreme Court says foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay have rights under the Constitution to challenge their detention in U.S. civilian courts.

The justices, in a 5-4 ruling Thursday, handed the Bush administration its third setback at the high court since 2004 over its treatment of prisoners who are being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba.

Here's the link to the SCOTUS opinion, Boumediene vs Bush

From Balkinzation, here's an early summary of the case.

The Court held 5-4, in an opinion by Justice Kennedy, that the petitioners at GTMO have a constitutional right to petition for habeas corpus and that the DTA/MCA process of D.C. Circuit review from CSRT decisions is not an adequate alternative to habeas. On the latter ruling, as I predicted, the mess of the Bismullah case might have been the straw that broke the camel's back: "The order denying rehearing [in Bismullah] was accompanied by five separate statements from members of the court, which offer differing views as to scope of the judicial review Congress intended these detainees to have. Under the circumstances we believe the costs of further delay substantially outweigh any benefits of remanding to the Court of Appeals to consider the issue it did not address in these cases."

Thus, the petitioners will be able to have habeas petitions considered in district court.