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 (249)

RelevanceDateRelease Date
May 23, 2004 | FBI | ACLU-RDI 2997
Email between FBI Officials on the Law Rnforcement On-line system with an update on detainee operation in Iraq, May 23, 2004. Email includes detailed notes and photographs describing the conditions of Camp Bucca, Iraq. The agent provides an ...
Feb. 06, 2004 | CID | ACLU-RDI 10
A Lieutenant Colonel admitted to issuing a death threat and firing his pistol next to the head of a detainee suspected of being part of a plot to assassinate U.S. troops, including the Lt. Col. This was supposedly done during an interrogation. ...
Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Physical assault, General, Threat, Assault/death
Sept. 19, 2003 | CID | ACLU-RDI 12
CID Investigation in to allegations that a Non-Commissioned Officer and soldier from 19th Quartermaster( QM) Company, 240th QM Battalion, pushed an Iraqi civilian into the back of their truck, to an isolated area, robbed him of his watch and ...
Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Jacqueline J. Scott, Thom Jones, Nelson van Eck
Physical assault, General
July 01, 2004 | CID | ACLU-RDI 13

On 1/18/04, a detainee gave a statement about abuse he had suffered at Abu Ghraib and also stated that he had witnessed a translator forcibly sodomizing a male juvenile detainee while a female U.S. soldier observed and took pictures. (This ...

Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Charles A. Graner, Jr., Ivan L. Frederick, II, Megan M. Ambuhl, Javal Sean Davis, Sabrina D. Harman
Physical assault, Sexual, General, Stress positions, Dietary manipulation, Environmental manipulation, Hooding/Goggling, Nudity, Other Humiliation, Sexual
June 10, 2004 | CID | ACLU-RDI 14

Approximately 73-year-old Iraqi woman reported that she had been subjected to assault and sexual abuse, including being sodomized with a stick and touched in private areas; that she was forced to "swim" in water thrown on ...

Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Jacqueline J. Scott, Nelson van Eck, Thom Jones
Use of water, Other, Physical assault, Sexual, General, Cramped confinement, Use of phobias, Isolation, Dietary manipulation, Environmental manipulation, Light or sound, Hooding/Goggling, Other Humiliation, Sexual
Dec. 19, 2003 | CID | ACLU-RDI 20

On November 14, 2003, a soldier provided a sworn statement saying that while he was deployed to Iraq, he "saw what I think were war crimes.... In my mind, my chain of command did nothing to stop these war crimes, and allowed them to ...

Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Dietary manipulation, Environmental manipulation, Hooding/Goggling, Other
Mar. 08, 2004 | CID | ACLU-RDI 21

Investigation found probable cause to believe that the commander and three other members of Operational Detachment-Alpha 343, 3rd Special Forces Group, had committed the offenses of murder and conspiracy when they lured Mohamed Sayari, an ...

Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Jacqueline J. Scott, Thom Jones
Mohammed Sayari
Sept. 20, 2004 | CID | ACLU-RDI 84
Investigation into two detainees' allegation that they had been assaulted by U.S. forces while being transported from Camp Cuervo to Abu Ghraib. One detainee reported that the soldier who assaulted him said "It's all because of you mother ...
Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Jacqueline J. Scott, John Peterson
Physical assault, General
Sept. 02, 2004 | CID | ACLU-RDI 86
Report of investigation of detainee’s allegation that a male U.S. soldier had slapped him across the face, causing him to bleed from the nose or the mouth and pushing him into concertina wire at the base of a chain link fence, causing the ...
Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Jacqueline J. Scott, John Peterson
Physical assault, General
May 31, 2003 | CID | ACLU-RDI 102
CID Report of investigation regarding alleged misconduct by six U.S. soldiers in Baghdad, Iraq between April 22 and May 18, 2003. Investigation “established cause to believe [two soldiers committed an unlawful weapons transfer to an Iraqi ...
Dec. 30, 2004
Investigative File (CID), Photograph
Nelson van Eck