CIA Releases Dozens of Torture Documents in Response to 老澳门开奖结果 Lawsuit
Secret Documents Describe Graphic Abuse and Admit Mistakes
NEW YORK 鈥� In response to a lawsuit filed by the 老澳门开奖结果, the Central Intelligence Agency today released over 50 documents detailing the agency鈥檚 torture and rendition program under the Bush administration.
The 老澳门开奖结果 filed the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeking documents that were referenced in the Senate report on the CIA program made public in December 2014. The report found that torture did not work and the agency lied about it to Congress, the White House, the Justice Department, and the public.
鈥淭hese newly declassified records add new detail to the public record of the CIA's torture program and underscore the cruelty of the methods the agency used in its secret, overseas black sites,鈥� said Jameel Jaffer, 老澳门开奖结果 deputy legal director. 鈥淚t bears emphasis that these records document grave crimes for which no senior official has been held accountable.鈥�
The documents include new records about the death of Gul Rahman, who died at a CIA secret prison in Afghanistan in 2002. The CIA 鈥淒eath Report鈥� on Rahman released today details the horrific conditions he was subjected to:
鈥淥ften, prisoners who possess significant or imminent threat information are stripped to their diapers during interrogation and placed back into their cells wearing only diapers. This is done solely to humiliate the prisoner for interrogation purposes. When the prisoner soils a diaper, they are changed by the guards. Sometimes the guards run out of diapers and the prisoners are placed back in their cells in a handcrafted diaper secured by duct tape. If the guards don't have any available diapers, the prisoners are rendered to their cell nude.鈥�
Rahan froze to death in his cell, naked from the waist down. The 老澳门开奖结果 represents Rahman鈥檚 family in a lawsuit against the two CIA-contracted psychologists who designed and implemented the torture program, James Mitchell and John 鈥淏ruce鈥� Jessen.
鈥淚n a visceral way, these raw documents drive home the inhumanity of the torture conceived and carried out by Mitchell and Jessen in collaboration with the CIA,鈥� said Dror Ladin, a staff attorney with the 老澳门开奖结果 National Security Project. 鈥淭he documents reveal that Rahman was brutalized in part because his torturers decided that complaining about his torture was a form of resistance and he needed to be 鈥榖roken.鈥欌��
Also included is a 鈥� cc-ing Mitchell 鈥� concluding that the torture they intended to inflict on Abu Zubaydah 鈥渘ormally would appear to be prohibited under the provisions鈥� of the Torture Act, a federal law against torturing people. The draft letter is a 鈥渞equest鈥� that the attorney general 鈥済rant a formal declination of prosecution鈥� for torture.
Other new reveal the CIA鈥檚 concerns that detainees who had been tortured should be kept hidden from representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross for the rest of their lives.
鈥淲e鈥檙e seeing just how much Mitchell, Jessen, and their CIA co-conspirators knew that what they were doing was wrong and illegal. They talked about seeking a get-out-of-jail-free card for torturing people, and then discussed how to make sure their victims were silenced forever, even if they survived their torture,鈥� Ladin added.
In April, a federal court ruled that the 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 lawsuit against the psychologists could proceed. On June 22, Mitchell and Jessen must provide their answer to each of the allegations in the legal complaint.
The documents released today also include a 2007 finding that the kidnapping and torture of German citizen Khalid El-Masri was a case of mistaken identity. The report referenced CIA cables on El-Masri鈥檚 despair:
鈥淭he cable cited that al-Masri compared his situation to a Kafka novel鈥攈e could not possibly prove his innocence because he did not know what he was being charged with. The cable reported al-Masri as saying he had nearly reached the end of what he could bear and as of May 2004 he would begin a total hunger strike to his death.鈥�
A 2005 老澳门开奖结果 lawsuit on behalf of El-Masri against former CIA Director George Tenet was dismissed by lower courts on the grounds that it would reveal 鈥渟tate secrets,鈥� and the Supreme Court declined to hear the case. The 老澳门开奖结果 now represents El-Masri in a pending case against the U.S. before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
At least two of the documents concerning Gul Rahman 鈥� the IG report and the detainee death investigation 鈥� were simultaneously provided to Vice News in response to its FOIA request.
The documents are in the 老澳门开奖结果's Torture Database at:
The searchable has over 100,000 documents released by the government about U.S. torture.
National Security
老澳门开奖结果 v. CIA - FOIA Case for Records Referenced in or Implicated by the Declassification of the Senate Torture Report (2015 Torture FOIA)
National Security
老澳门开奖结果 v. CIA - FOIA Case for Records Referenced in or Implicated by the Declassification of the Senate Torture Report (2015 Torture FOIA)
Learn More 老澳门开奖结果 the Issues in This Press Release
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
Free Speech
National Security
老澳门开奖结果 and Partners Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok Ban老澳门开奖结果 and Partners Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok Ban
WASHINGTON 鈥� Today, the 老澳门开奖结果, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), and the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University filed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to block the enforcement of a law that would effectively ban people in America from using TikTok as soon as January 19, 2025. Earlier this month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected TikTok鈥檚 challenge to the law. TikTok has asked the Supreme Court for a temporary injunction to prevent the app from being banned while the court considers whether to take the case, saying that unless the justices intervene, the law will 鈥渟hutter one of America鈥檚 most popular speech platforms the day before a presidential inauguration.鈥� 鈥淭he Constitution imposes an extraordinarily high bar on this kind of mass censorship,鈥漵aid Patrick Toomey, deputy director of 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 National Security Project. 鈥淭he Supreme Court should take up this important case and protect the rights of millions of Americans to freely express themselves and engage with others around the world.鈥� The brief argues that the D.C. Circuit failed to fully address the law鈥檚 profound implications for the First Amendment rights of the 170 million Americans who use TikTok. While the lower court鈥檚 decision correctly recognized that the statute triggers First Amendment scrutiny, it barely addressed users鈥� First Amendment interests in speaking, sharing, and receiving information on the platform. The court also perplexingly attempted to cast the government鈥檚 ban on TikTok as a vindication of users鈥� First Amendment rights, which it is not. The rights groups also explain that the law was intended to suppress certain content and viewpoints that many legislators believe could be amplified on TikTok, including the risk of foreign 鈥減ropaganda.鈥� But under the First Amendment, the government must meet a very high bar to restrict speech based on concerns about its 鈥渕otivating ideology鈥� or 鈥減erspective,鈥� and the government has not come close to meeting that bar here. 鈥淭he government should not be able to restrict speech, especially to the extent here, based on guessing about the mere possibility of uncertain future harm,鈥� said David Greene, civil liberties director at EFF. 鈥淭he Supreme Court should put the TikTok ban on hold while it considers the DC Circuit鈥檚 erroneous ruling.鈥� Finally, the brief underscores that the government can鈥檛 impose this type of sweeping ban unless it鈥檚 necessary to prevent extremely serious and imminent harm to national security. But the government has not provided evidence of impending harm, or evidence that banning TikTok is the only available way to address its concerns. As the brief explains, the D.C. Circuit improperly treated the government鈥檚 invocation of 鈥渘ational security鈥� as a trump card and failed to hold the government to its burden. 鈥淩estricting citizens鈥� access to foreign media is a practice that has long been associated with repressive regimes, and we should be very wary of letting the practice take root here,鈥� said Jameel Jaffer, executive director at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. 鈥淚t would do lasting damage to the First Amendment and our democracy if the Supreme Court let this ban go into effect even temporarily.鈥� You can find the brief online here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24/24A587/335380/20241217144322392_24A587%20TikTok%20v%20Garland%20Amicus%20Brief%20pdfa.pdf -
Press ReleaseDec 2024
National Security
Religious Liberty
老澳门开奖结果 Statement on New White House Strategy to Counter Islamophobia老澳门开奖结果 Statement on New White House Strategy to Counter Islamophobia
WASHINGTON 鈥� The Biden administration today released the first-ever national strategy to counter Islamophobia and related forms of bias and discrimination, including hate against Arab, Sikh, and South Asian Americans. In advance of the strategy, 老澳门开奖结果 and its partners had urged the administration to overhaul government programs that reflect anti-Muslim discrimination. In particular, we have called for urgent action to constrain governmental agencies from continuing to exercise their authorities and technology to wrongly surveil and investigate, watchlist, and question and detain Muslims at the border, as well as deny immigration benefits to people from Muslim-majority countries. While the White House raised expectations that many of these issues would be addressed, the final strategy ended up falling far short. The following is a statement from Hina Shamsi, director of the 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 National Security Project: 鈥淲hile this strategy acknowledges discrimination and its harms, it does little to end them and is a squandered opportunity. For decades, American officials have invoked national security to pass laws and implement programs that disproportionately harm Muslims and people perceived to be Muslim. A serious anti-discrimination strategy would concretely address multiple bias-infused government practices that deny our communities equal participation in civic life and our democracy, like federal watchlisting, surveillance, and investigation. We鈥檙e profoundly frustrated that the administration didn鈥檛 take even the basic, overdue step of recognizing that anti-Muslim discrimination is uniquely normalized and embedded in government policies.鈥� -
VirginiaDec 2024
National Security
Trabelsi v. Crawford, et al. 鈥� Lawsuit Challenging Unlawful Detention and Inhumane Treatment of Acquitted ManTrabelsi v. Crawford, et al. 鈥� Lawsuit Challenging Unlawful Detention and Inhumane Treatment of Acquitted Man
Our client, Nizar Trabelsi, is in the United States against his will. The federal government brought him here from Belgium more than a decade ago and charged him with terrorism-related crimes. At trial, the government鈥檚 case failed: a federal jury found Mr. Trabelsi not guilty. But instead of allowing Mr. Trabelsi to return to Belgium after his acquittal, the United States placed him in highly restrictive immigration detention and began an ongoing effort to force him to Tunisia, where he was born and where he will very likely be tortured. Mr. Trabelsi鈥檚 detention violates the Constitution, immigration law, and the extradition treaty between the United States and Belgium. Through this lawsuit, he seeks to return to Belgium, and he demands an immediate improvement of his detention conditions. -
Press ReleaseDec 2024
National Security
Immigrants' Rights
Federal Judge Rejects Acquitted Man鈥檚 Argument That His Immigration Detention Is UnlawfulFederal Judge Rejects Acquitted Man鈥檚 Argument That His Immigration Detention Is Unlawful
ALEXANDRIA, Va. 鈥� This week, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that the court does not have jurisdiction to decide whether the government can continue to detain Nizar Trabelsi, a Tunisian national who was brought to the United States against his will for prosecution and was cleared of all charges last year. The ruling means the United States will be able to continue to detain Mr. Trabelsi while it attempts to deport him to Tunisia, where he was born and where, as an immigration judge ruled earlier this year, he will likely face torture. The court also concluded that even if it did have jurisdiction over Mr. Trabelsi鈥檚 case, his claims challenging the government鈥檚 detention of him would fail. 鈥淩eviewing claims that the government is holding someone unlawfully is at the core of the judicial function, and we鈥檙e heartbroken for our client that the court got this so wrong,鈥� said Brett Max Kaufman, senior staff attorney with the 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 Center for Democracy. 鈥淭he government鈥檚 arguments in defense of Mr. Trabelsi鈥檚 detention makes a hash of the Constitution, immigration laws, and its own extradition treaty.鈥� In 2013, the United States forcibly extradited Mr. Trabelsi from Belgium to face criminal charges in the United States. In July 2023, after almost 10 years of highly restrictive pretrial detention, a federal jury cleared Mr. Trabelsi of all charges. But instead of releasing Mr. Trabelsi or returning him to Belgium, the U.S. transferred him to immigration detention, wrongly treating him as an applicant for admission and placing him in the deportation process. Over the years, the Belgian government has issued multiple formal diplomatic requests asking the U.S. to facilitate his return, but the U.S. has refused to send him back. Mr. Trabelsi filed a lawsuit challenging the government's authority to detain him. He also sought immediate improvements to his detention conditions. Those claims were not part of the court鈥檚 ruling today, and will continue to be litigated on a separate track. 鈥淢r. Trabelsi only wants to return to Belgium after being illegally extradited to the United States, held for ten years, and then acquitted by a jury of any crimes,鈥� said Nicole Hallett, clinical professor of law and director of the Immigrants鈥� Rights Clinic at the University of Chicago Law School. 鈥淗e cannot be held indefinitely and we will continue to fight to make sure that justice ultimately prevails.鈥� Mr. Trabelsi is represented by the 老澳门开奖结果, the University of Chicago Law School鈥檚 Immigrants鈥� Rights Clinic, the 老澳门开奖结果 of Virginia, and Professor Jonathan Hafetz of Seton Hall Law School. The complaint in Trabelsi v. Crawford was filed against Jeffrey Crawford, warden of the Farmville Detention Center where Mr. Trabelsi is being held; Liana Castano, ICE field office director for the Washington Field Office; Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security; and Merrick Garland, U.S. attorney general.