Torres v. United States

ALTIMARI, Circuit Judge:

Like the Phoenix, this ease rises from the smoldering ashes of a young woman’s discarded political beliefs. Almost two decades ago, petitioner-appellant Marie Haydee Beltran Torres (“Torres”),1 a member of the Fuerzas Armada de Liberación Nacional (“FALN”),2 believing that the United States was Puerto Rico’s enemy, took the position that United States’ courts had no jurisdiction over those who supported Puerto Rican independence.

Torres was indicted for the 1977 bombing of the Mobil Oil Building in Manhattan, for which the FALN claimed responsibility, and which resulted…