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 (80)

Emails include a PowerPoint slide entitled "CID Detainee Summary Briefing for the Director of the Army Staff," The summary discusses detainee abuses and deaths, highlighted among the deaths are the deaths of Abed Hamed Mowhoush, Zaydun Ma'mun ...
Criminal Investigation Command (CID) report into allegations of assault, cruelty and maltreatment of a detainee by guards at Abu Ghraib. Among the detainee's allegations, he stated that a US Army Sergeant hung him by his arms from the bars of a ...
CID report of investigation into allegations made by a detainee that, after his first arrested on April 25, 2004 he was punched, kicked and slapped at then transported to a facility at Mosul Airfield known as the “Disco”. He stated that during ...
Feb. 15, 2006
Investigative File (CID)
Use of water, Other, Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Sleep deprivation, Environmental manipulation, Nudity

This document is the Court Martial - charge and prosecution package for Specialist Charles A. Graner, Jr. of the 372nd Military Police Company. SPC Graner was a key figure in the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal and this document contains the ...

Detainee alleged that while at Abu Ghraib prison several soldiers slapped; punched; choked; struck his head, shoulders, and arms with a retractable metal baton; jumped on him; forced him to lean against a wall in a seated position; forced him to ...
Detainee reported that he was arrested after US forces found a weapon in his home. He was detained at Al Sijood Palace, Iraq, and it was during this detention he states he was hooded; flexicuffed; punched; kicked; yelled at; and threatened. ...
A detainee alleges he was burned with "hot gases" coming from a transport vehicle while he lay on his stomach in the back of the vehicle while being transported. Medical records revealed that the detainee suffered burn injuries which required ...
Feb. 15, 2006
Investigative File (CID)
Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Cramped confinement
Email includes notes from a May 7, 2004 Senate Armed Services Committee, which summarizes the incidents which led to the death of Iraqi Major General and detainee Abed Hamed Mowhoush.
This is a statement by a Sergeant interrogator/translator who reported four incidents of potential detainee abuse that he witnessed or were related to him by detainees. The first incident of possible detainee abuse was the rough handling of a ...
Dec. 21, 2005
Investigative File, Interview (Statement)
Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Forced physical training
Memo details a complaint made by a Private First Class (PFC), alleging that his unit members engaged in unlawful behavior. The PFC first alleged that while on patrol his platoon sergeant, a Sergeant First Class, ordered soldiers to fire upon ...
Dec. 21, 2005
Non-legal Memo
Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Other