Well, don't that beat all.

Saddam Hussein, convicted and sentenced to hang tonight (9:30 or 10:00 pm EST) has appealed to a U.S. judge to stay his execution.

Hussein's lawyers filed documents Friday afternoon asking for a stay of execution. The 21-page request was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington before Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly.

Attorneys argued that because Hussein also faces a civil lawsuit in Washington, he has rights as a civil defendant that would be violated if he is executed. He has not received notice of those rights and the consequences that the lawsuit would have on his estate, his attorneys said.

"To protect those rights, defendant Saddam Hussein requests an order of this court providing a stay of his execution until further notice of this court," attorney Nicholas Gilman wrote.

Saddam was captured, brought up on charges, tried, convicted, had his appeal, and now should be executed all within a period of three years. Here in the U.S., a death-row inmate can spend twice that long or much longer caught up in appeals.

What a deplorable statement about the justice process in the USA that the fledgling and fragile democracy we're trying to help start up can deliver justice more quickly than we can. Perhaps we should be taking notes from the Iraqis on how to dispense justice for those who are convicted?

Note also that this decision came down from a court where death threats were made and carried out repeatedly. Here in the U.S., courts are intimidated by everything, except the rulings of the Supreme Court, of course.

The Iraqis aren't missing the importance of this execution, either:

In his Friday sermon, a mosque preacher in the Shiite holy city of Najaf called Saddam's execution "God's gift to Iraqis."

"Oh, God, you know what Saddam has done! He killed millions of Iraqis in prisons, in wars with neighboring countries and he is responsible for mass graves," said Sheik Sadralddin al-Qubanji, a member of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, known as SCIRI, a dominant party in al-Maliki's coalition. "Oh God, we ask you to take revenge on Saddam."

[via Drudge]