OPR Torture Report Still Under Review, Should Be Released "Soon"
Thursday 07 January 2010
by: Jason Leopold, t r u t h o u t | Report
The Department of Justice is still working on the report prepared by an agency watchdog that probed several legal opinions John Yoo and two other former attorneys who worked at the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) wrote for the Bush White House on torture, an agency spokeswoman said Wednesday.
"The {review} process is ongoing and we hope to have {the report} complete and released soon," Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler told Truthout.
The Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) completed the report in December 2008 following a five-year investigation.
Adding to the delay in releasing the report (Attorney General Eric Holder testified before Congress last year that the report was complete and was expected be released by end of November), according to several legal sources knowledgeable about the review process, were additional responses to its conclusions that Yoo filed via his attorney, Miguel Estrada. The legal sources spoke on the condition of anonymity because the report is still classified.
If that's true, the career prosecutor charged with reviewing the report would have to carefully review Yoo's responses and, as Holder testified last November, "react to those responses" as well.
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http://www.truthout.org/01071011