Gitmo Prosecutor Denies Detainees Tortured

[Judi Lynn]

Gitmo Prosecutor Denies Detainees Tortured
Guantanamo Prosecutor Says Some Tactics May Be Viewed As Torture, but Denies It's True
By M.R. KROPKO



Col. Morris Davis

CLEVELAND Mar 7, 2006 (AP)— The chief prosecutor of a military commission on Tuesday denied detainees at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba were tortured, but said he could see why some investigative techniques could be viewed that way.
(snip)

"There is no evidence we are going to offer that I have seen that I would call tantamount to being derived from torture," Davis said in an interview with The Associated Press before a speech at Case Western Reserve University's law school.

Laws dealing with torture generally define it based on the effects, such as significant physical or emotional pain, Davis said, not on specific methods.

"Some things, 99 people out of 100 would agree, meet that threshold," Davis said. "There are probably other things 99 of 100 would agree don't meet that threshold. There is a tremendous gray area in between where each of us strikes a balance at a different point."
(snip/...)

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1698689&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312

[shoelace414]

1. everytime they deny it they always say

"there is no evidence" Rummy said the same thing.

[Inland]

12. I suspect what they really mean is

"You have no evidence". Implying "you can't prove a thing, therefore I'm not going to discuss it, now run along."

[unhappycamper]

2. "I was only following orders."

'nuff said. :thumbsdown:

[yourout]

3. They always change the defination of the laws they break.

Accused of torture by water board or other methods.....no problem...just say water boarding is not torture.

Accused of spying on Americans.....no problem....call it a domestic MONITORING program.

[leftchick]

4. I believe this torture victim

these torturers are monsters....

http://books.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329420538-101750,00.html

Then he said, "I've decided to send you to Cairo, where you will talk." He told me that Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, who was supposedly the highest-ranking member of al-Qaida in US custody, had been sitting just where I was, a few weeks before.

"He played the same games with us as you did, and we sent him to Cairo. He talked there within two hours. You'll do the same."

After that first heavy interrogation they took me into another room and left me there. Guards tied my hands behind my back, hog-tied me so that my hands were shackled to my legs, which were also shackled. Then they put a hood over my head. It was stuffy and hard to breathe, and I was on the verge of asthmatic panic. The perpetual darkness was frightening. A barrage of kicks to my head and back followed. Lying on the ground, with my back arched, and my wrists and ankles chafing against the metal chains, was excruciating. I could never wriggle into a more comfortable position, even for a moment. There was a thin carpet on the concrete floor, and a little shawl for warmth - both completely inadequate.

I lost track of day and night - not only was I usually in the hood but, in any case, the window was boarded up. Eventually, someone came in and removed the hood. I was there in isolation for about a month. Once they kept me from sleeping for about two days and two nights. A guard kept coming in and if I nodded off he woke me. By the end of that I was completely drained and disoriented.

[niallmac]

5. A question about something I see too often.

"The Bag Over The Head". Anyone else claustrophobic besides me out there? When did locking a bag over peoples heads become ok like putting on the cuffs?
Put a bag over my head and I will go bat shit. If I could not conjure up one other reason to hate this "So Called War On Terrorism" (CNN's words) the bag thing would
be all I needed to loath it as I do now.
So now they know my Room 101 weakness.
Why is the bag over the head OK? Who decides who gets the bag? Will it be you when you are picked up for questioning about all your internet 'questioning?'
Paranoia aside, I just want to know who decided to kill torture etc with my tax dollars? I don't like my country doing all this torture stuff to people who as far as anyone knows haven't done anything or if they did it was probably in defense of their families from us. (And if they DID do a naughty then lets have a HEARING!)
All I ever wanted for my tax dollars was some public services, health care, some schools that don't suck.

[The Stranger]

6. Torture became nearly exclusively psychological decades ago.

Intelligence studies spanning years and studying the history of torture through the 20th century (including in Totalitarian regimes) concluded that psychological torture, where the victim turns on him or herself, is the most effective. Physical pain is only used to increase this kind of pain.

The Republican Right Wing torturers are playing upon this supposed discrepancy between the techniques of the Inquisition and those formulated from modern Pschology in order to flout the law, and here it is made explicit, surprisingly.

[Lerkfish]

7. well, that settles it, then. nothing to see here....

[Solly Mack]

8. I wish the fuck I could play loose and fast with the law and it's

definitions.

But your honor, I didn't stab him to death. He fell on my knife 23 times. I know how it might look to some, but really, am I responsible for the dead man being clumsy?"

[gratuitous]

9. This is the PROSECUTOR?

Nothing like giving away your case before you even bring it. What happens when the evidence is developed and it turns out the "gray area" is the blackest torture? Can Davis' intemperate words here be used as a defense by the perpetrators? "The prosecutor himself said we weren't torturing people! You can't convict me of torture!"

Thanks a lot for defending America and its military, Mr. Davis. Please retire now, because as sure as God made little green apples, the same "techniques" our military has been using at Guantanamo will be used against our own soldiers, sailors, pilots and marines. Will we call it torture then?

[Reader Rabbit]

10. Well, of course he does!

Honestly. Did anyone actually expect the guy to say, "Yup. We're torturin' here"?

[HuffleClaw]

11. "There is no evidence we are going to offer...

...that I have seen that I would call tantamount to being derived from torture,"

wow, what a mouthful. poor guy, can't be much fun to have to lie for a living.