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 07, 2004 | CIA-OIG | ACLU-RDI 4525

A heavily redacted version of a report authored by the CIA's Office of the Inspector General.  The report was later released in less-redacted form.  It discusses the CIA's use of the "enhanced interrogation techniques," ...

May 27, 2008
Oversight Report
John L. Helgerson
John C. Yoo, George J. Tenet, George W. Bush, John L. Helgerson, John A. Rizzo, John McLaughlin
Abu Zubaydah, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed
EIT, Use of water, Waterboarding
DOD | ACLU-RDI 4757
DOD Deleted Page Information Sheet
Mar. 15, 2004 | DOS | ACLU-RDI 4758

State Department cable originating from the embassy in Baghdad describing CPA Administrator Paul Bremer's meeting with Samarra community leaders. Their meeting included discussions of concerns over security and treatment of detainees in Iraq.

May 27, 2008
Cable
L. Paul Bremer
May 23, 2008 | DOJ | ACLU-RDI 4506
DOJ letter regarding ACLU, et al., v. Department of Defense, et al., which states that the CIA has re-reviewed documents concerning waterboarding and produced redacted versions of some of those documents. Letter also mentions that on May 12, ...
May 23, 2008
Letter, Judicial
Michael J. Garcia | Sean H. Lane | Peter M. Skinner
Melanca D. Clark
Michael J. Garcia, Sean H. Lane, Peter M. Skinner
EIT, Use of water, Waterboarding
Mar. 14, 2003 | OLC | ACLU-RDI 5018

This legal memo from the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) of the Justice Department to the Department of Defense analyzes the legal standards governing military interrogations of "alien unlawful combatans" held outside the United ...

Apr. 01, 2008
Legal Memo
John C. Yoo
William J. Haynes, II
John C. Yoo, William J. Haynes, II, Timothy E. Flanigan, Alberto R. Gonzales, Patrick Philbin, Jay S. Bybee, Daniel J. Bryant, Robert J. Delahunty, Ari Fleischer, William Howard Taft, IV, John B. Bellinger, III, James C. Ho, Daniel Dell'Orto
Feb. 26, 2009 | ACLU-RDI 6401
This document is a "CaseMaps Facts report" providing information on an interview with Charles Frahm. It provides dates and times, summaries, and sources for all statements. The interviewee states that he did not observe an improper behavior from ...
Feb. 11, 2004 | DOA | ACLU-RDI 4852
530th Military Police Battalion-Camp Ashraf Mission Brief/PowerPoint presentation on the rights of enemy prisoners of war (EPWs). The presentation includes Geneva Convention articles and principles, which discuss the proper treatment of EPWs.
Jan. 05, 2007
Other
Antonio Taguba
Antonio Taguba
DOD | ACLU-RDI 4853
News article about a German television news report that reported the torture and killing of an Iraqi prisoner by US soldiers at a US military base in Al Asad West, Baghdad, Iraq. The news program, Spiegel TV, reported that a 47 year old Iraqi, ...
Jan. 05, 2007
Other
Luis A. Santiago
Asad Abdul Kareem Abdul Jaleel
Other
May 08, 2003 | DOD | ACLU-RDI 4854
Executive Summary discussing the U.S. Southern Command's request to use additional interrogation techniques. On April 16, 2003, the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, approved the following techniques: change of scenery down, which was ...
Jan. 05, 2007
Non-legal Memo
Donald H. Rumsfeld
Sleep deprivation, Isolation, Dietary manipulation, Environmental manipulation, Temperature, Manipulation of interrogator’s identity, Other
June 30, 2003 | DOD | ACLU-RDI 4855
The general scope of the email is the treatment of detainees, enemy prisoners of war (EPWs) and 'illegal combatants.' The author mentioned that he/she did not believe a particular team was following the rules outlined in Army Regulation 190-8. ...