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Thursday, January 15, 2009

Bush Official Calls it "Torture"

A retired Judge, Cheney Defense Department official and current Gates appointee whose job it is to manage the Guantanamo prosecutions has refused to prosecute a federal prisoner because "we tortured him" according to an interview that Susan Crawford gave to The Washington Post. According to The Post article, this is a sample of what American agents have done to Mohammed al-Qahtani in our collective name:

His interrogation took place over 50 days from November 2002 to January 2003, though he was held in isolation until April 2003.

"For 160 days his only contact was with the interrogators," said Crawford, who personally reviewed Qahtani's interrogation records and other military documents. "Forty-eight of 54 consecutive days of 18-to-20-hour interrogations. Standing naked in front of a female agent. Subject to strip searches. And insults to his mother and sister."

At one point he was threatened with a military working dog named Zeus, according to a military report. Qahtani "was forced to wear a woman's bra and had a thong placed on his head during the course of his interrogation" and "was told that his mother and sister were whores." With a leash tied to his chains, he was led around the room "and forced to perform a series of dog tricks," the report shows.

The interrogation, portions of which have been previously described by other news organizations, including The Washington Post, was so intense that Qahtani had to be hospitalized twice at Guantanamo with bradycardia, a condition in which the heart rate falls below 60 beats a minute and which in extreme cases can lead to heart failure and death. At one point Qahtani's heart rate dropped to 35 beats per minute, the record shows.

But Bush spokesperson Dana Perino sets the record straight by re-assuring America: "Let me just make sure it's clear — and I'll say it on the record one more time — that it has never been the policy of this president or this administration to torture," so I guess that should settle the matter once and for all.

I reasonably Doubt it.

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Spero T. Lappas, J.D., Ph.D.

Spero T. Lappas, J.D., Ph.D., is an author, scholar, and lawyer headquartered Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He has earned a PhD in American Studies from The Pennsylvania State University where he researched the relationship between the American law and culture and where he has taught courses in American Studies and Public Policy. He graduated with honors from Allegheny College (BA ‘74), where he was twice named an Alden Scholar, received Departmental Honors at graduation and the Muhlfinger Prize for his independent research and from the Dickinson School of Law (JD ‘77), where he was on the Editorial Board of the Dickinson Law Review, a member and faculty adviser of the National Trial Moot Court Team, and winner of two American Jurisprudence Awards. He was later named to Dickinson's Woolsack Society.

He is licensed to practice law before the Supreme Court of the United States, all Pennsylvania state courts, and several federal courts. He has served as lead counsel in hundreds of major civil, criminal, and civil rights cases, including some of Central Pennsylvania's most important criminal and civil trials. In the criminal courts he has defended several death penalty murder cases, federal drug felonies and conspiracies, federal sports bribery, state and federal crimes of violence, major fraud allegations, and most other varieties of cases in which citizens have been charged with serious state and federal crimes. In the civil rights arena he has represented plaintiffs in cases involving police misconduct, excessive force, wrongful arrest and prosecution, sex discrimination, disparate impact, disparate treatment, prisoners rights, students rights, age and race discrimination, wrongful death, freedom of speech and association, search and seizure, and whistle blowers rights.

He served as an inaugural member of the Pennsylvania Senate Advisory Committee to Study the Causes of Wrongful Convictions and the Pennsylvania Legislative Advisory Committee to study the Death Penalty.

His career achievements have been recognized in many leading volumes and publications about legal professionals. He was among the nation's youngest attorneys to be named in the first edition of The Best Lawyers in America. He has been listed in Who's Who in American Law, Who’s Who in the World, Who's Who in Finance and Industry, Who's Who in America, Who’s Who Among Emerging Leaders in America, America's Leading Lawyers and The Bar Register of Pre-Eminent Lawyers. He has an A rating -- the highest possible recognition -- from the Lexis/Nexus Peer Reviewed rating system.

He has been an adjunct professor at Widener University School of Law and Harrisburg Area Community College, a University Graduate Fellow at Penn State, and a member of the ACLU (where is on the board of directors for the local chapter), American Mensa, and the U.S.Fencing Association. His publications have appeared in the Dickinson Law Review, The Champion (the journal of the National Association of criminal Defense Lawyers), the Harrisburg Patriot-News, The Burg newspaper and the Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography.

He is a prize-winning photographer whose work has appeared in several galleries, one-artist shows, and personal and corporate collections, a tournament Scrabble champion, and a competitive three weapon fencer.

He frequently speaks to civic and community organizations about matters of public importance. To arrange an appearance, please contact Dr. Lappas at sperolappas.jd.phd@gmail.com.