# 26. Judicial manipulation ## 26.5. Methodology/Refinements/Sub-species ### 26.5.1. Suspension of legal process (internment etc.) The suspension of legal process generally occurs when a government has lost control of a situation and, in a desperate attempt to regain civil power, resorts to the suspension of normal judicial process. The "logic" is that by arresting everyone remotely connected, they are bound to get the real perpetrators. It's an absurd and ineffective strategy, but it is common amongst desperate governments. During the "troubles" in Northern Ireland, the British government suspended normal legal process for several years and implemented an illegal process of internment without trial26.1. We use the term "illegal" advisedly, because the United Kingdom's treatment of those detained was later considered to be "illegal" in terms of the British constitution (as far as it exists). But it was also described by the European Court of Human Rights as "inhuman and degrading", and by the European Commission of Human Rights as "torture". The effect of this decision was to bolster republican antagonism, which gave rise to a generation of armed unrest in Ireland. Guantanamo provides an even more contemporary example of the manipulative folly of suspending due process of law. Eleven years after the establishment of this illegal process and institution, the United States is still, internationally, considered a pariah state because of its use of kidnapping, torture and illegal detention without trial26.2. The consequences of this strategy continue to cost the USA both "blood and gold", as it did the United Kingdom in Northern Ireland for more than two generations.