Foregone conclusion

The verdict from the first trial of Husein was, as expected, "guilty." No surprise there. Hussein was tried and convicted a long time ago and the formality of the trial -- what former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark and one of Hussein's lawyer's called a "travesty" -- served as nothing more than a sideshow meant to demonstrate that, in a country currently demonstrating very little of it, justice was being done in at least one case. The only real question now will be whether this causes the Sunnis to riot or not. A curfew was imposed in anticipation of Sunni reaction but so far, reactions seem tempered.

Hussein received the death penalty for "willful killings," and two 10 year sentences for torture and forcible deportation.