Terror trial in NYC to cost $216 million

How much security could the US buy with $216 million (note that is just NYC's costs)? How many other things could you buy with that money?

In a letter obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, Mayor Michael Bloomberg put the cost at $216 million for the first year after Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other suspects arrive in Manhattan from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. After that, the mayor said it would cost $200 million annually for as long as the men are detained in the city -- mainly overtime for extra New York Police Department patrols. . . .

Federal officials have said they're still determining the security costs and how they will be paid. No date has been set for the trial.

Attorney General Eric Holder announced last month that Mohammed, the professed mastermind of the 2001 attacks, and four accused of being al-Qaida henchmen would be tried in federal court in lower Manhattan. The court complex, including a jail that would hold the men, is just blocks from where the World Trade Center towers were destroyed in the attack on Sept 11, 2001. . . .