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 (6)

This is a moderately redacted cable which summarizes the mechanics and legal basis for use of enhanced interrogation techniques on detainees. The cable states that "our attorneys have presented our legal analysis to the legal adviser to the NSC, ...
This email chain includes two cables discussing the status of Abu Zubaydah's interrogation and describing his condition. The first cable is dated August 2, 2002 and describes Abu Zubaydah's condition on day 45 of the isolation phase. It also ...
This cable describes the enhanced interrogation techniques that interrogation teams can employ, pending approval and sets forth federal law which limits the use of these techniques by U.S. government personnel and requires that interrogation ...
This cable provides formal authorization to proceed with portions of the next phase of Abu Zubaydah's interrogation, which include "more aggressive techniques" in order to obtain information, that the interrogation team concludes he is ...
The Criminal Investigation Task Force (CITF) interviewed two detainees at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to learn of camp conditions. The interview was conducted by the FBI and other agencies. One detainee explained that since being detained at ...
Dec. 21, 2005
Interview (Summaries/Notes)
Physical assault, General, Stress positions, Other Humiliation, Other
Memo describes the observations of a FBI agent, who observed the improper handling of a detainee in an interrogation room at Camp Delta. The agent was in a video observation room and saw a detainee on his knees rubbing a cramp out of his leg ...
Dec. 21, 2005
Non-legal Memo
Stress positions, Other Humiliation