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 (4791)

This is a redacted memo which discusses the interrogations Mitchell and Jessen are involved with and where they are needed. Mitchell is associated with the interrogation of several different detainees, all redacted except for Gul Rahman.
Dec. 20, 2016
Non-legal Memo, Cable
James Mitchell , Bruce Jessen
Gul Rahman
EIT
This is a report from interrogators at COBALT, a CIA black site in Northern Kabul, Afghanistan, describing the status of Gul Rahman's interrogation. It is reported that Rahman was not responding to interrogation by Bruce Jessen; the responder ...
Dec. 20, 2016
Non-legal Memo, Email, Cable
Bruce Jessen
Gul Rahman
EIT, Use of water, Other, Physical assault, General, Sleep deprivation, Isolation, Environmental manipulation, Light or sound, Temperature
This document is a CIA Memo drafted for the Deputy Director for Operations via the Associate Deputy Director for Operations/Counterintelligence. The previous release of this document (on June 13, 2016) included more redactions such as Bruce ...
Report from the Office of Inspector General on Counterterrorism Detention and Interrogation Activities from September 2001-October 2003, specifically focusing on the use of Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EITs). In September 2016, a version ...
This paper written by James Mitchell and John Jessen discusses interrogation resistance techniques described in Al Qaeda training documents, how to recognize when these techniques are being employed, and strategies for developing countermeasures.
Sept. 26, 2016
Non-legal Memo
James Mitchell and John Jessen
James Mitchell , Bruce Jessen
This document is a CIA Memo drafted for the Deputy Director for Operations via the Associate Deputy Director for Operations/Counterintelligence. The memo contains background information related to the treatment and condition of detainees as it ...
This CIA cable outlines the recommended interrogation plan for Gul Rahman and states that it should include "environmental deprivation" and "concentrated interrogation exposure." Specifically, sleep loss and fatigue are suggested as most ...
Sept. 02, 2016
Cable
Bruce Jessen
Gul Rahman
EIT, Sleep deprivation, Environmental manipulation
This letter from Steven Bradbury to the CIA's Associate General Counsel is a response to the CIA's November 6, 2007 letter regarding the interrogation of [redacted]. This letter states that applying the interrogation technique in question for the ...
Aug. 31, 2016
Letter
Steven G. Bradbury
This Jan. 22, 2002 memo from Jay Bybee (OLC) to Alberto R. Gonzales (Counsel to Pres. George W. Bush) and William H. Haynes II (General Counsel of the DOD) responds to a request for advice on the effect of the War Crimes Act and the Geneva ...
Aug. 31, 2016
Legal Memo
Jay S. Bybee
Alberto Gonzalez | William J. Haynes, II
Alberto Gonzalez, William J. Haynes, II, Jay S. Bybee, George W. Bush
An OLC memo from John Yoo to John Rizzo regarding "what is necessary to establish the crime of torture." The memo states that an individual must act with the "specific intent" to inflict severe mental pain or suffering to have committed torture, ...
Aug. 31, 2016
Legal Memo
John C. Yoo
John A. Rizzo
John C. Yoo, John A. Rizzo, Jennifer Koester