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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings, Torture and Big Money |
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June 11th,
2004 - Use of Dogs to Scare Prisoners Was Authorized |
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Use of Dogs to Scare
Prisoners Was Authorized Military Intelligence Personnel Were Involved, Handlers Say By Josh White and Scott Higham Washington Post Staff Writers Friday, June 11, 2004; Page A01 U.S. intelligence personnel
ordered military dog handlers at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq to use
unmuzzled dogs to frighten and intimidate detainees during interrogations
late last year, a plan approved by the highest-ranking military intelligence
officer at the facility, according to sworn statements the handlers provided
to military investigators. A military intelligence
interrogator also told investigators that two dog handlers at Abu Ghraib were
"having a contest" to see how many detainees they could make
involuntarily urinate out of fear of the dogs, according to the previously
undisclosed statements obtained by The Washington Post. The statements by the dog
handlers provide the clearest indication yet that military intelligence
personnel were deeply involved in tactics later deemed by a U.S. Army general
to be "sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses." President Bush and top
Pentagon officials have said the criminal abuse at Abu Ghraib was confined to
a small group of rogue military police soldiers who stripped detainees naked,
beat them and photographed them in humiliating sexual poses. An Army
investigation into the abuse condemned the MPs for those practices, but also
included the use of unmuzzled dogs to frighten detainees among the
"intentional abuse." So far, the only charges to
emerge have been against seven MPs and do not include any dog incidents, even
though such use of dogs is an apparent violation of the Geneva Conventions
and the Army's field manual. The military intelligence officer in charge of
Abu Ghraib later told investigators that the use of unmuzzled dogs in
interrogation sessions was recommended by a two-star general and that it was
"okay." The newly obtained documents
reinforce the picture that the abuse falls into two categories: sexual
humiliation and beatings at the hands of MPs, and intimidation using dogs
that is clearly tied to military intelligence. The sexual abuse happened
weeks and even months before the dog incidents, some of which appear to be
part of an organized strategy by military intelligence to scare detainees
into talking, according to the statements. Sgts. Michael J. Smith and
Santos A. Cardona, Army dog handlers assigned to Abu Ghraib, told
investigators that military intelligence personnel requested that they bring
their dogs to prison interrogation sites multiple times to assist in
questioning detainees in December and January. Col. Thomas M. Pappas, who was
in charge of military intelligence at the prison, told both soldiers that the
use of dogs in interrogations had been approved, according to the statements. "I have talked to Col.
Papus [sic] and he said it was good to go," Smith told an investigator
on Jan. 23. Neither Smith nor Cardona
has been charged in connection with the abuse at Abu Ghraib. "It's all
under investigation," said Lt. Col. Pamela Hart, an Army spokeswoman. The men could not be reached
yesterday to comment. Two officers at the U.S. Army Trial Defense Service
said that a military lawyer has been assigned to Cardona and that a message
seeking a comment would be relayed to the attorney. The officers said they
did not know whether a lawyer from the Army's defense service had been
assigned to represent Smith. In Army memos regarding
interrogation techniques at the prison, the use of military working dogs was
specifically allowed - as long as higher-ranking officers approved the measures.
According to one military intelligence memo obtained by The Post, the officer
in charge of the military intelligence-run interrogation center at the prison
had to approve the use of dogs in interrogations. There is no explanation in
the memo of what parameters would have to be in place - for example, whether
the dogs would be muzzled or unmuzzled - or what the dogs would be allowed to
do. The Army previously has said that the commanding general of U.S. troops
in Iraq - Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez - would have had to approve the use of
dogs. Human rights experts said
the use of dogs at Abu Ghraib violates longstanding tenets regulating the
treatment of prisoners and civilians under the control of an occupying force,
including the Army's field manual, which prohibits "acts of violence or
intimidation" by American soldiers. "Using dogs to frighten
and intimidate prisoners is a violation of the Geneva Convention," said
Elisa Massimino, Washington director of Human Rights First, an international
organization based in New York. "It's a violation of U.S. policy as
stated in the Army field manual, and it's a violation of the prohibition
against cruel treatment." The dog teams at Abu Ghraib
were part of a security detail that also searched for weapons, explosives and
contraband. The general in charge of military prisons in Iraq, including Abu
Ghraib, said the dog teams were under the control of military intelligence
but had no training or experience in helping with interrogations. Cardona's dog, a tan Belgian
Malinois named Duco, was trained to be part of a narcotics and patrol team.
Cardona told investigators he also helped military intelligence with two
interrogations and later was summoned by military police to draw information
out of a detainee on Tier 1 of the prison, site of the worst documented
abuse. Smith said military
intelligence personnel asked him to instill fear in detainees. He said that
he would bring his dog, a black Belgian shepherd named Marco, to the tier
specifically to scare prisoners after they were pulled out of their cells. At
the behest of interrogators, he said, in some cases he would bring the
barking dog to within six inches of the prisoners. "Is using the dog in
this manner an allowable tool by the MI interrogators?" an investigator
asked Smith. "Yes," he replied. The dog handlers arrived at
Abu Ghraib in late November, sometime after the abuse of detainees had been
captured in photographs, including the images of the naked human pyramid and
forced masturbation. Master-at-Arms 1st Class
William J. Kimbro, a Navy dog handler, said he was summoned to Tier 1 one
night in November to help search a cell for explosives using his dog, Nicky,
a black and tan Belgian Malinois. Earlier that night -- records indicate it
was Nov. 24 -- a prisoner had allegedly been found with a weapon. When Kimbro
and Nicky concluded the search, they were called to the second floor of the
cellblock to search another cell. "There was a bunch of
yelling going on in the cell and my dog started going ape," Kimbro told
investigators, adding that interrogators were yelling at a detainee in the
corner. "I remember one of the males saying to the detainee, if the detainee
did not provide the information the guy was asking about, then he would have
me let ... my dog go on him." Kimbro said he was surprised
by the comment and tried to calm Nicky down. He soon left, he said, upset
that interrogators had tried to use his dog as an interrogation tool. "I was leaving because
this is not what my dog is trained for," Kimbro said in one of three
statements he provided to investigators. "We do not use our dogs for
interrogation purposes." Kimbro was singled out for
praise in Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba's report about abuse at the prison for
refusing "to participate in improper interrogations despite significant
pressure from the MI personnel at Abu Ghraib." Smith and Cardona said they
complied with the MI requests because they believed the tactics had been
approved by Pappas, the military intelligence officer in charge of the
prison. They told investigators that they spent time on the cellblocks,
allowing their dogs to bark at the detainees. They said a non-commissioned
officer from military intelligence approached them in mid-December. "He asked us if we
could use our dogs for interrogation purposes," Cardona said in a
statement. "They were trying to get it cleared. We went outside and saw
Col. Pappas. He told us MI wanted to use the dogs for interrogations and he
told us that they had received permission to use dogs in an interview." Smith recalled the same
conversation, saying he spoke with Pappas in the parking lot the night after
Saddam Hussein was captured -- Dec. 14. He said he was told that the use of
the dogs was permitted. Later that night, the two
dog handlers took their dogs to an interrogation booth holding a detainee.
Interrogators told them the dogs did not need to be muzzled, they said. "When we got to the
room the detainee was sitting in the doorway, with his feet in the doorway
and the door was open," Smith said. "My dog and Sgt. Cardona's dog
were both barking at the detainee and we never got closer than 18 inches.
Neither dog had a muzzle on." Also in mid-December, the
dog handlers said they were asked by one of the MPs, Staff Sgt. Ivan L.
"Chip" Frederick II, for help in dealing with an uncooperative
detainee. Part of what followed was captured in photographs that have come to
define the abuse at Abu Ghraib: A naked prisoner was up against a wall, two
dogs squaring off against him. The detainee, identified in
the documents as Ballendia Sadawi Mohammed, said he was suddenly snatched
from his bed in cell No. 5 one night and sent into the hallway handcuffed. "They sent the dogs
toward me. I was scared," Mohammed told investigators. "The first
dog bit my leg and injured me there and this was bad luck. The bite from the
first dog caused me to have 12 stitches from the doctor of my left leg as a result
I lost a lot of blood." Spec. Sabrina D. Harman, a
member of the 372nd Military Police Company, said she saw the incident and
said the detainee was bitten after he tried to run from the dog and was
cornered. Cardona, whose dog apparently bit the detainee twice, once on each
leg, justified letting his dog go to the end of its leash because he believed
the detainee was fighting with Spec. Charles A. Graner Jr. Military investigative
records show that Frederick and Graner were key participants in the abuse.
Harman, who said she saw two other inmates with dog bites around late
December, also has been charged. In early January, Cardona
said, he used his dog during an interrogation at the "Wood"
facility at Abu Ghraib, a collection of wooden interrogation booths set up
behind the prison. Cardona said a non-commissioned military intelligence
officer asked him to bring his dog into a booth and make it bark to scare the
prisoner. "I asked him if he
wanted Duco to be in a muzzle and he said no," Cardona told investigators.
"We went into the booth and there was a detainee in the booth with a bag
over his head. Duco barked at him for about two or three minutes and they
were asking the detainee questions." On Jan. 13, Spec. John
Harold Ketzer, a military intelligence interrogator, saw a dog team corner
two male prisoners against a wall, one prisoner hiding behind the other and
screaming, he later told investigators. "When I asked what was
going on in the cell, the handler stated that he was just scaring them, and that
he and another of the handlers was having a contest to see how many detainees
they could get to urinate on themselves," Ketzer said. Research editor Margot
Williams contributed to this report. © 2004 The Washington Post
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