After September 11, 2001, U.S. officials authorized the cruel treatment and torture of prisoners held in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo, and the CIA's secret prisons overseas.

This database documents the U.S. government's official experiment with torture. At present, the database contains well over 100,000 pages of government documents obtained primarily through Freedom of Information Act litigation and requests filed by the ACLU, and through litigation of Salim v. Mitchell, a lawsuit brought by the ACLU on behalf of the survivors and the family of a dead victim of the CIA torture program. To learn more about the database, please read the About and Search Help pages. If you're a developer, you can also access this data through our API.

Search Result (6709)

RelevanceDateRelease Date
May 13, 2004 | ACLU-RDI 4194
Memo includes excerpts from an ICRC press statement on the U.S. government's detention policies. The ICRC's President asked the U.S. to institute due legal process and to make significant changes for the more than 600 detainees being held in ...
Dec. 30, 2004
Non-legal Memo
Charles L. Daris, Margaret J. Pollack, Carol T. Santos
May 13, 2004 | DOS | ACLU-RDI 4274

Press release of trancript of Secretary of State Colin L. Powell On BBC TV with Huw Edwards. Sec. Powell discusses Iraq; Abu Ghraib prison abuse; and the President Bush & UK PM Blair relationship.

Dec. 17, 2004
Other
Colin L. Powell, Donald H. Rumsfeld, Richard B. Myers, George W. Bush
May 13, 2004 | DOS | ACLU-RDI 4276
Press release of trancript of Secretary of State Colin L. Powell On BBC TV with Huw Edwards. Sec. Powell discusses Iraq; Abu Ghraib prison abuse; and the President Bush & UK PM Blair relationship..
Dec. 17, 2004
Email
Sara A. Stryker
George W. Bush, Colin L. Powell, Donald H. Rumsfeld, Richard B. Myers, Sara A. Stryker
May 13, 2004 | DOS | ACLU-RDI 4337
State Department cable to the U.S. Mission in Venna to deliver remarks of Sec. Powell to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe May 13, 2003. The points to make are i) The Military Commissions will be impartial; ii) there is a ...
Dec. 17, 2004
Cable
Colin L. Powell, George W. Bush
May 13, 2004 | DOS | ACLU-RDI 4639
DOS Note discussing letters sent by UN Rapporteurs asking for explanations regarding allegations of torture at detention facilities in Iraq. Refers to one letter that discusses the detention of four Iraqis allegedly being held incommunicado in Basra.
Nov. 23, 2004
Notes
Kim R. Holmes
Kim R. Holmes, L. Paul Bremer, Jeffrey DeLaurentis
May 13, 2004 | Non-US | ACLU-RDI 4729
This letter is from Shafiq Rasul and Asif Iqbal, two former Guantanamo detainees. The letter is on the letterhead of the Centre for Constitutional Rights and states that
May 09, 2005
Letter
Shafiq Rasul | Asif Iqbal
George W. Bush
George W. Bush, David McWilliams, Geoffrey D. Miller
Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal
Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Cramped confinement, Sleep deprivation, Environmental manipulation, Light or sound, Hooding/Goggling, Other Humiliation, Sexual
May 13, 2004 | ACLU-RDI 5068
This article describes "a set of secret rules for the interrogation of high-level Qaeda prisoners" that the Bush Administration, Department of Justice, and CIA adopted after September 11.
Mar. 15, 2013
Other
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, Ramzi Bin al Shibh, Walid Bin Attash, Jose Padilla
Use of water, Waterboarding, Dietary manipulation, Environmental manipulation, Light or sound, Other
May 13, 2004 | FBI | ACLU-RDI 6276
The document is an internal FBI email with attachments that include a description of interrogation technique concerns raised to Commanding General Miller as well as an outline of approved coercive techniques used by the military.
June 15, 2011
Email
Geoffrey D. Miller
Mohammed al Qahtani
May 13, 2004 | FBI | ACLU-RDI 6380
This document is an email chain discussing acquiring agents for an interrogation and the allowability of various interrogation methods. One email mentions that "due to the issues at Abu G prison," interrogations have been suspended but "will in a ...
May 14, 2004 | DOA | ACLU-RDI 484

Emails between Army officers sharing the results of the Taguba Report concerning the events of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Mar. 23, 2005
Email
James R. Helmly, Antonio Taguba, Janis Leigh Karpinski, Paul Hill, Julian H. Burns, Donald J. Ryder