Pamela Hess, The Associated Press
A U.S. military officer warned Pentagon officials that an American detainee was being driven nearly insane by months of punishing isolation and sensory deprivation in a U.S. military brig, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.
While the treatment of prisoners at detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and in Afghanistan and Iraq have long been the subject of human rights complaints and court scrutiny, the documents shed new light on how two American citizens and a legal U.S. resident were treated in military jails inside the United States.
The Bush administration ordered the men to be held in military jails as “enemy combatants” for years of interrogations without criminal charges, which would not have been allowed in civilian jails.
The men were interrogated by the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency, repeatedly denied access to attorneys and mail from home and contact with anyone other than guards and their interrogators. They were deprived of natural light for months and for years were forbidden even minor distractions such as a soccer ball or a dictionary.
“I will continue to do what I can to help this individual maintain his sanity, but in my opinion we’re working with borrowed time,” an unidentified Navy brig official wrote of prisoner Yaser Esam Hamdi in 2002. “I would like to have some form of an incentive program in place to reward him for his continued good behavior, but more so, to keep him from whacking out on me.”
Yale Law School’s Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic received the documents through a Freedom of Information Act request filed by two attorneys Jonathan Freiman and Tahlia Townsend, representing another detainee, Jose Padilla. The Lowenstein group and the American Civil Liberties Union said the papers were evidence that the Bush administration violated the 5th Amendment’s protections against cruel treatment. The U.S. military was ordered to treat the American prisoners the same way prisoners at Guantanamo were treated, according to the documents.
However, the Guantanamo jail was created by the Bush administration specifically to avoid allowing detainees any constitutional rights. Administration lawyers contended the Constitution did not apply outside the country.
(Original Article)
i think i would prefer to be beheaded than to be at guantanamo bay and come out 5 years later a physical and mental wreck.
sometimes death is better than humiliation. guantanamo is a fate worse than death.death is something one comes to term with eventually.humiliation can never be forgotten …..do you wonder why these men go back to their former ways. you cannot keep on humiliating a people and expect no response.
Its so fukin dum wt you all aRe talkin about you lot i think all da muslimS in the prison should
Be let free because if it was christians den all you lot we’ll be doin soo much jus to get them out and you lot are jus racist to muslims i dont care wt anyone says inshallah all da muslimS we’ll be free
These peopole should get the same treatment that we would give any criminal of war. The Nazis got a trial and they killed millions of people. These people should get at least what they got. I think that we are doing a bit too much in all of these torturing. They are being treated in a prejudice way and those that were in charge of them are being nothing, but racist and those that think it is okay are also being racist. I know what happened on Sept. 11th was a terrible terrible thing, but these people didn’t actually do it and if they don’t like America they have that right. There are countries that I don’t care for. I am sure that if they didn’t like it before they got to Cuba they surely didn’t like it after. Things like what happened there are what gives us a bad name and I very much wish that there weren’t people like this that make us all look bad.
I can’t believe it!
Sure these men have done some sort of criminal crime in our modern day society, but in my opinion people deserve second chances. And half of the men that go into the rotton facilities at guantanamo bay most probably are innocent, its corrupted. Hopefully Barrack Obama will shut down the facility as soon as possible, they are criminals but even criminals deserve certain rights.
Most average Americans are satisfied that the Republicans were voted out of office and Obama has promised change. We need to stop the partisan stalemate that is American politics. Middle America is sick of it. Yes we understand the god awful importance of it, constitutional rights and all, however if you think Americans are loosing sleep at night worrying about terrorist being tortured then you are spending too much time in your echo chambers. I personally see the so called out rage at the treatment of detainees disingenuous. It smells of vindictiveness, revenge and a deep desire to humiliate the former administration. If the intellectual left were really concerned about people being tortured and abused where are the voices for Americans being tortured right here in American prisons, all 2 million plus of them. They are routinely held in isolation, deprived medication, proper diet, held in cold rooms and anything else prison guards feel like doing to the prisoners. This goes on day in day out with out much being said. I personally know of at least 2 prisoners who died for no other reason except medical neglect, So please stop crying for your partisan investigations and prosecutions. There really are more important things to do right now. You may not think so but “The People” know and understand this. If the left keeps this up it will surly backfire. The left wants to gamble with the future of the party. When Americans punish you at the polls don’t say you were not warned.
OK so yea we were attacked 1at! BUT theese people being held arent the ones who attacked us. I agree our government should be able to protect us at any cost however theese people are still people.
It seems that from reading a few comments that some of you hate non christians or hate Muslims, I too was scared to death of all arabs and Muslimsm but I have learned there is good and bad in every race and religon and noone should be treated like this no matter who they are. UNLESS its a child molester then I say string em uo.
How can we demand peace if we are constantly terrorising the middle east.?
I so expect hate mail so go ahead [email protected] 🙂
Chris,
The point of granting everyone equal rights under the law is so that in case you or I are arrested, we are treated as innocent until proven quilty.
When you are ready to give up those rights for yourself then you are in a position to deny them to others.
Until then… you are simply another hypocrite pretending to believe in the “unalienable rights” of every human being as codified in our Declaration of Independence.
mikael no soup, jay, anyone read, get your head out of your ass for just one minute. its not even bush’s fault for anything that has happened to this country. theres a reason he was elected to a second term. Its the new democratic congress thats being stupid, not letting bush pass his veterans right’s acts, or any scheduled troop removal acts. so no body better call bush an ass. 2. take away the severe punishment at guantanamo, you have either a)extremist terrorist in public prisons (great idea) or b) a bunch of guys that should be tortured until they kill themselves. In iraq, people would line up on the street, if you were too ugly, you were decapitated. if you were handicapped or mentally retarted, you were killed, infront of your families. now what are there motives? religion? morals? law? who knows. but when these people threaten to destroy america, the symbol of freedom, the escape for these families whose loved ones have been killed because they were fat, you say “treat them with human rights. who cares if they know the plan for the bombing america” america is the land of the free. by mistreating those who have caused so much more pain, we plan to make the world a better place. these people in guantanamo bay are there because they think they are gods, so if they want to be gods, fine. they are not human and do not deserve human rights.
none of u lot no anything about the incidents that happend in da past. All of u are blind folded, jus type in ‘the truth behind 9/11’ in google and have a look at what u find.
CLOSE THIS JAIL
Thank you for your kind comments. I do not approve of torture as a matter of policy but, as I noted, sometimes its about choices. We are in a war, though some would disagree with that but that’s the way I see it. Past wartime presidents have had to make tough choices in time of war: Lincoln, Wilson, FDR for example. They bent the Constitution as they thought it was necessary to preserve the nation, but their circumventions did not become a matter of policy. I think Pres. Bush was in a similar position and did what he thought was necessary to protect his troops and his citizens. I can’t fault him for that. President-elect Obama is now hinting that he may continue Bush’s policies, at least for a while; I respect his integrity for saying this, for it shows he is willing to be pragmatic rather than dogmatic. Ultimately, the Constitution exists for the benefit of the people, not the other way around. I guess I side with the late Barry Goldwater who so aptly put it, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.”
Kyle,
Thank you for posing your questions in such a mature and adult fashion. Educating the drooling sycophants that often attack these pages gets old so it is refreshing to engage in simple debate with a decent, educated human being.
Torture and blowing up buildings are both wrong, and they both should be illegal and the perpetrators should be punished in a manner consistent with existing laws. In extreme circumstances the law will be ignored anyway by those of character who understand that on extremely rare occasions, circumstances and integrity merit acting in contradiction to existing law.
In the scenario you gave (straight out of every episode of the FOX hit “24” but almost never a real circumstance) the police, military, Intelligence officers or you and I would almost certainly do whatever needs to be done to resolve it successfully. That should be the rarest of rare exceptions, and if it were me, I would turn myself in afterwards, explain the entire circumstances to the judge and throw myself on the mercy of the court. No jury in the land would convict a father or husband in an actual case like this.
That is a far cry from establishing torture as standard operating procedure, devoting entire prison camps to carry out that policy and lying to (most members of) Congress in order to continue the illegal practice – not to mention lying to the American people (Bush: “America doesn’t torture”). This is also a far cry from policies that allowed for the kidnapping and systematic torture of children in some cases for over six years (arrested at age 14 in some cases) without ever bringing charges upon these and other prisoners who were eventually released.
Evidence gained by torture isn’t admissible in court, which is why so many ACTUAL enemies have had to be released to rejoin the fight against us – which no matter what you feel morally about torture is reason enough to abstain. This is one of many reasons why the top four Intelligence agencies reported back to the Bush Administration and unanimously agreed that the “War on Terror” was making America LESS safe rather than more safe and that our occupation of Iraq had created a breeding ground for terrorists where none had existed before.
Evidence gained from torture has proven to be resoundingly untrustworthy. Sure, some truths are spoken, but in most cases, the person being tortured will say absolutely anything they feel the torturers want to hear in order for the agony to cease.
Those who are tortured, or those whose family members or friends, or countrymen, or allies were tortured, will be justifiably enraged and are far more likely to retaliate in kind – making the job of our military that much more dangerous if they themselves are captured.
Establishing the policy that torture was routinely permissible, which is what Gonzales, Yoo, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush, etc. did, created an environment at Abu Gahrib, for instance, that opened the door to some twisted people to indulge in their sadistic fantasies.
Torture may very well be the correct option under extremely rare circumstances, but that is no excuse to roundly condone it, universally justify it and certainly not under any circumstances is their any good reason to allow it to become the law of the land.
“Torture” is wrong, but so’s blowing up buildings. Sometimes the choices in life are between lousy and lousier. Here’s a thought experiment for you: one day (and I hope this never happens) one of your loved ones, husband, wife, child, whatever, is kidnapped. The police have the guy in custody but he isn’t giving up where he has the person stashed. If they “overstep their Constitutional bounds” a little, they might be able to extract the info and find the person alive. If they go strictly by the book, “Rule of Law” and all that, he clams up and with any luck they’ll find the person’s body someday. If they come to you and ask you what choice do they make, what will you tell them? For most Americans, it would be an agonizing choice. Believe it or not, I don’t think the Bush Administration took the choices they made lightly either. It’s easy for us on the outside to say what ought to be done when we have no affect on the outcome; when the responsibility becomes ours, it’s a different matter.
“Evidence? Who cares about evidence?”
Everyone who believes in habeas corpus, the Rule of Law and the basic premise that every effort must be made to discern who is innocent and who is guilty. What you are advocating is anarchy in place of civilized government.
“The mere fact that you are still here and free to call (Bush) whatever names you want is proof that he is not (Adolf Hitler).”
No Poop, a quick search of this thread makes clear that you are the only one comparing Bush to Hitler. You just erected a classic ‘strawman’ argument and then huffed and puffed and blew it down – declaring a hollow victory for yourself. Congratulations!
And to be clear, the mere fact that I am still here and free to call Bush the wannabe tyrant, hollow shell of a man and the worst disaster ever to reside in our White House that he is has everything to do with the constraints and checks and balances designed into our governmental system that he did everything within his power to destroy and absolutely nothing to do with who this pathetic excuse for a leader that Bush HAS BEEN.
OMG how I love talking about Bush in the past tense!!!
Evidence? Who cares about evidence? The whole idea was to find out what they are planning on blowing up next, not to put them on an episode of “Law and Order”. Besides, if Bush is the criminal you say he is, he would probably just order the bodies dumped in the ocean; lack of “evidence” is no impediment to a tyrant.
Get a clue; if GWB really were Adolf Hitler, all of his critics including yourself would be sitting around huddling in a cellar or else pushing up daisies somewhere. Take a look at the historical record and see for yourself. The mere fact that you are still here and free to call him whatever names you want is proof that he is not.
“revisionist works of Howard Zinn”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA!
That’s a good one Speachie! Give me another one!!!
Oh and No Soup:
Do you know the reason why so many have been released?
BECAUSE DUMB FUCK BUSH INSISTED ON TORTURING THEM SO THE EVIDENCE AGAINST THEM COULDN’T BE USED!!!!
Then there’s this:
—————————
Reuters reported:
The Pentagon said on Tuesday that 61 former detainees from its military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, appear to have returned to terrorism since their release from custody.
Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said 18 former detainees are confirmed and 43 suspected of “returning to the fight.”
He said the figures, updated at the end of December, showed a higher rate of recidivism than seen in a previous report showing 37 former detainees as active militants.
He provided no details about the detainees or their countries of origin.
“The overall known terrorist re-engagement rate has increased to 11 percent” from about 7 percent, Morrell said.
The numbers were generated by the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency based on fingerprints, photographs and intelligence reports, he said.
—————————
I guess they’re not as bad off as you thought if they can still manage to come back to work after their stay. But tell the professor not to worry; if one of them blows up Yale Law School, we’ll make sure he gets a good lawyer.
And what “truly independent sources” on CIA history would you recommend to the Captain, Mikael? The revisionist works of Howard Zinn?
“The bastards attacked us first, Andrew!”
Really? Read the history of the CIA and get back to us, Captain.
Hello Andrew
After reading the whole article, I can only conclude that the torture inflicted on these terrorists was, indeed, justified! I believe that anything that the government has to do to keep this country safe (and that includes you, you know) is A-OK with me. Why don’t you think about what the terrorists have done, and continue to do to our brave men and women serving our country? At least we don’t behead our prisoners!! The bastards attacked us first, Andrew! To blame Bush for protecting this country is just terribly wrong! I’m just glad that citizens like you don’t have to serve (that’s right, you don’t have to sign up, and you still receive protection). This country would cease to exist, except as subjects of the mullahs, and believe me, you would be one of the first to be tortured or killed, just for speaking out, which, BTW is another freedom that you could kiss goodbye! I wonder what you would be doing (besides praying to their just and righteous Allah five times a day)if your fate was in the terrorists’ hands? FYI, read the latest jihad issued by binLaden, just today.