Alexandria, Va. — The wild hair and beard were gone, the tunic was replaced by a green prison jumpsuit, and no anti-American defiance could be heard in the soft voice that acknowledged charges that he conspired to kill Americans in Afghanistan.
Upright and respectful, accused American Taliban soldier John Philip Walker Lindh, 20, seemed a model of humility Thursday in federal court where his high-powered legal team began an aggressive defense with accusations that Lindh had been held improperly.
Lindh, surrounded by his lawyers and glancing at the prosecution table to his right, spoke three times.
"Yes, I understand the charges," he told U.S. Magistrate W. Curtis Sewell after the four felony charges were read aloud. "Yes, I understand them," he said after hearing that each charge carries a life sentence. And when Sewell asked at the end if Lindh had questions, he replied, "No, I don't have any questions."
The hearing lasted 12 minutes. Lindh unshackled, his head and face shaved clean was whisked out a side door and back to a nearby jail in this Washington suburb without looking at his parents, who watched from a second-row bench.
Fighting the public image
Afterward, lawyers for both sides and Lindh's parents began the long and intricate public-relations battle that will center largely on two questions: How valid is the confession Lindh gave FBI agents after being captured by U.S. forces early last month? and who is John Walker Lindh turncoat terrorist or misguided youth?
Lindh's parents, who spent 20 minutes with their son before the hearing in a holding cell divided by heavy glass, stood before a media throng outside the Albert V. Bryan Federal Courthouse and appealed for sympathy.
"John loves America. We love America," said his father, Frank Lindh, standing beside his former wife, Marilyn Walker. "John did not do anything against America. John did not pick up arms against America. He never meant to harm any American, and he never did harm any American. John is innocent of these charges."
Walker, her voice barely audible, added, "It's been two years since I last saw my son. It was wonderful. My love for him is unconditional and absolute."
Lindh, converting to Islam in his teens, last left California two years ago for Yemen to study Arabic and Islam, then went to Pakistan and then Afghanistan. He was captured with Taliban soldiers in November near Mazar-e-Sharif, in northern Afghanistan.
Frank Lindh said his son was "in good physical condition" but "didn't get medical treatment" until being transferred from a detention center in Afghanistan to an assault ship in the Arabian Sea.
Pleas for attorney 'ignored'
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld disputed that assertion Thursday.
If Lindh's parents provided a balm for their son's image, his lawyers were a battering ram, contending that Lindh had asked for a lawyer almost immediately after his capture by U.S. forces.
"For 54 days, the United States government has kept John Lindh away from a lawyer," said James Brosnahan, the San Francisco attorney hired by Lindh's parents, who live in an affluent suburb north of the city. "For 54 days he was held incommunicado."
The government says Lindh waived his right to a lawyer when confessing to FBI agents that he became a foot soldier for Osama bin Laden last summer and fought for the Taliban against the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan.
But if Lindh's lawyers can prove the waiver was coerced, they could have the confession dismissed and remove what appears to be the government's key evidence. "Don't miss this trial," Brosnahan told reporters. "There will be witnesses. There will be FBI agents. They will be examined and cross-examined."
Other defense attorneys are George Harris, who prosecuted former defense secretary Caspar Weinberger in the Iran-Contra case, and former federal prosecutors Bill Cummings and Tony West.
At a news conference later, Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft dismissed the image of Lindh as innocent. "Terrorists didn't compel John Walker to join them; John Walker chose terrorists," Ashcroft said, using the name by which Lindh was indicted, although Brosnahan said in court that Lindh is his proper name.
Ashcroft added, "He chose to waive his right to an attorney, both in writing and orally, before his statement to the FBI."
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