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 (110)

This document is a response to an inquiry to cases of detainee abuse at Guantanamo. There are eleven (11) cases of substantiated misconduct, the incidents are not listed in chronological order.
July 22, 2005
Non-legal Memo
Other, General, Sexual, Forced physical training, Other, Use of water, Physical assault, Other Humiliation

General Bantz J. Craddock, Commander United States Southern Command, ordered an AR 15-6 investigation into alleged instances of abuse at Guantanamo. He appointed Brigadier General John T. Furlow and Lieutenant General Randall M. Schmidt to ...

This document is the Charge Sheet against Sergeant Scott A. McKenzie for his Court Martial on abusing Iraqi detainees. It includes the charges; Articles of the UCMJ he is accused of violating; details of the charges; Sgt. McKenzie's plea to each ...
July 01, 2005
Legal Memo, UCMJ (Court-Martial)
David D. McKiernan
Scott A. McKenzie
Face slap or insult slap, Walling, General, Assault/death, Stress positions, Use of phobias, Other Humiliation, Physical assault, Threat
This is the Court Martial record of Specialist Timothy F. Canjar. It includes the charges against Spc. Canjar and his plea(s) as well as. Spc. Canjar was charged with: 1) dereliction of duty; 2) maltreatment of detainees (4 counts); 3) intent to ...

A summary of a FBI interview of a detainee being held at Camp X-Ray about the conditions of confinement in the camp.  During the interview, the detainee stated that Military Police "have been mistreating the detainees by pushing them ...

May 18, 2005
Non-legal Memo, Interview (Summaries/Notes)
Physical assault, General, Other Humiliation, Religious
Interview of a detainee at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay. The detainee that he had been answering questions for six months and his case has not improved. He stated "God tells Muslims to do a jihad against non - Muslims and countries that are not ...
May 18, 2005
Non-legal Memo, Interview (Summaries/Notes)
Physical assault, General, Other Humiliation, Religious
Interview of a detainee at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay. The detainee stated that on one occasion, in Camp Delta, a U.S. soldier removed his prayer cap and threw it into the trash. Also, stated that while in Afghanistan, a U.S. Soldier violently ...
May 18, 2005
Non-legal Memo, Interview (Summaries/Notes)
Physical assault, General, Other Humiliation, Religious
Interview of detainee at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay. When asked how he was doing the detainee stated "that things were not going well, and that he perceived current U.S. actions as a holy war between Christians and Muslims, propagated by ...
May 18, 2005
Interview (Summaries/Notes)
General, Cramped confinement, Temperature, Religious, Physical assault, Environmental manipulation, Other Humiliation
Interview of a detainee at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay. The detainee was asked about conditions at Camp Delta and he stated that "a lot of the brothers were still upset about the detainee who had attempted suicide six days earlier. Several of the ...
May 18, 2005
Non-legal Memo, Interview (Summaries/Notes)
Physical assault, General, Other Humiliation, Religious
Interview of a detainee at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay. The detainee advised the interviewing agent that he was well. The purpose of this interview was to build rapport with this detainee. As a result, no investigative information was obtained. ...
May 18, 2005
Non-legal Memo, Interview (Summaries/Notes)
Physical assault, General, Other Humiliation, Religious