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 (84)

This cable provides a report of day 8 of the cycle of interrogation carried out on detainee Abu Zubaydah on August 11, 2002. It includes details of interrogators using a combination of waterboarding, walling, cramped confinement, and hooding in ...
This is a general report on a cycle of interrogation carried out on August 10, 2002 on detainee Abu Zubaydah. It includes an overview of techniques used (including the waterboard, walling, hooding, and cramped confinement), in addition to brief ...
Dec. 20, 2016
Cable
Abu Zubaydah
EIT, Use of water, Waterboarding, Physical assault, Walling, Cramped confinement
This cable provides a report of day 5 of the cycle of interrogation carried out on detainee Abu Zubaydah on August 8, 2002. It includes details of interrogators using a combination of waterboarding, walling, cramped confinement, and hooding in ...
This cable details the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah that took place on August 6, 2002. This interrogation included the use of walling, waterboarding "numerous times", attention grab, insult slap, confinement box, and hooding. The cable states ...
This CIA cable describes the phase of Abu Zubaydah's interrogation and states that he underwent confinement, walling and the waterboard during his initial cycle of interrogations. The cable also describes his general behavior in his cell as well ...
Dec. 20, 2016
Cable
Abu Zubaydah
EIT, Use of water, Waterboarding, Physical assault, Walling, Cramped confinement

An OLC memo concluding that the CIA’s proposed interrogation plan for Abu Zubaydah — which contemplates methods including “insects placed in a confinement box” and “the waterboard” — does not violate ...

This CIA cable describes Abu Zubaydah's condition in detention as of July 19, 2002. The cable states that the next stage of Zubaydah's detention will include confinement, dressing changes, walling and a head immobilizer, as requested by IC SERE ...
Dec. 20, 2016
Cable
Abu Zubaydah
EIT, Walling, Cramped confinement, Isolation, Other, Physical assault
This July 2002 cable is a request for guidance from headquarters on the use of enhanced interrogation techniques. The cable expresses hesitation about using these techniques on subjects being held in solitary confinement without legal ...

This document is an undated draft memorandum analyzing whether the McCain Amendment would prevent the CIA from using its "enhanced interrogation techniques." The memo concludes that the McCain Amendment would not do so because (1) ...

An undated CIA memo arguing that the CIA's interrogation program does not violate the Convention Against Torture, 18 U.S.C. §§ 2340-2340A, or 18 U.S.C. § 2441. Part of the memo relies upon the contention that so long as ...