Texas psychologist Jim Cox filed a complaint against former CIA contractor and fellow Texas licensee , Dr. James Mitchell on June 17, 2010.  On July 7, 2010, Ohio and New York residents filed separate complaints against former Guantanamo psychologists, Dr. John Leso and Dr. Larry James.

The full complaints, released to the public by the complainants, are available here:

• Texas complaint against Dr. James Mitchell
• Ohio complaint against Dr. Larry James
• New York complaint against Dr. John Leso

James Mitchell

The Texas complaint, drafted by a Northwestern University law clinic and Texas attorney Dicky Gregg, alleges that:

[Dr. Mitchell’s ] transgressions fall into three categories:

• First, to achieve his ultimate plan of implementing a brutal interrogation and torture regime, Dr. Mitchell misrepresented his professional qualifications and experience to the Central Intelligence Agency. He also placed his own career and financial aspirations above the safety of others.

• Second, Dr. Mitchell designed this torture regime only by ignoring the complete lack of a scientific basis for the regime‘s safety and—assuming its safety—its effectiveness. In doing so, he failed to take reasonable steps to ensure the safety of others.

• Third, and most ominously, Dr. Mitchell himself tortured prisoners held in U.S. custody and directly supervised others who engaged in torture at his direction.

Larry James

Said Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic, counsel for Ohio complainants Michael Reese, Dr. Trudy Bond, Rev. Colin Bossen and Josie Setzler:

… Ohio-licensee Dr. Larry C. James [is the] former Chief Psychologist of the intelligence command at the U.S. Naval Station in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Despite the prison’s record of torture during his tenure, Dr. James obtained an Ohio psychology license in 2008 and currently holds the influential post of Dean at Wright State University’s School of Professional Psychology in Dayton.

According to the Ohio complaint, for several months in 2003, and from 2007-2008, Dr. James was the senior psychologist of the Guantánamo BSCT, a small but influential group of mental health professionals whose job it was to advise on and participate in the interrogations, and to help create an environment designed to break down prisoners.

During his tenure at the prison, boys and men were threatened with rape and death for themselves and their family members; sexually, culturally, and religiously humiliated; forced naked; deprived of sleep; subjected to sensory deprivation, over-stimulation, and extreme isolation; short-shackled into stress positions for hours; and physically assaulted. The evidence indicates that abuse of this kind was systemic, that BSCT health professionals played an integral role in its planning and practice, and that Dr. James, in his position of authority, at minimum knew or should have known it was being inflicted. [Read full press release here]

John Leso

Said the Center for Justice Accountability, counsel for New York complainant, Dr. Steven Reisner:

… the Center for Justice and Accountability … call[ed] for an investigation of Dr. John Francis Leso for his participation in abusive interrogation and torture, and for revocation of his psychologist’s license on that basis. …

Dr. Leso, a Major in the U.S. Army, led the first team of mental health professionals tasked with supporting interrogation operations at the U.S. detention camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The complaint alleges that Dr. Leso violated professional standards for New York psychologists when he recommended a series of escalating physically and psychologically abusive interrogation tactics to be used on detainees, personally supervised interrogations where his tactics were used, and actually participated in the application of these tactics. Many of the techniques and conditions that Dr. Leso helped put in place were applied to men and boys held at Guantánamo and eventually to detainees held in U.S. custody in Iraq and Afghanistan. [Read full press release here]

The full complaints, released to the public by the complainants, are available here:

• Texas complaint against Dr. James Mitchell
• Ohio complaint against Dr. Larry James
• New York complaint against Dr. John Leso

Larry James, JTF-GTMO 2008

State Psychology Board Challenged over Refusal to Investigate Alleged Ethical Violations by Dr. Larry James

May 12, 2010, Baton Rouge and New York – Today, Toledo-based psychologist Dr. Trudy Bond challenged the Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists’ failure to investigate alleged professional ethics violations by psychologist and retired U.S. Army colonel Dr. Larry C. James.  The case centers on Dr. James’s conduct as a high-ranking psychologist and interrogations advisor for the U.S. military at Guantanamo Bay.  A New Orleans native and former Louisiana State University employee, Dr. James is licensed to practice in Louisiana and Ohio, where he is now Dean of the School of Professional Psychology at Wright State University.

Attorneys argued before the Louisiana First Circuit Court of Appeal in the case Dr. Trudy Bond v. Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists. 

According to his own statements and government records, Dr. James played an influential role in both the policy and day-to-day operations of interrogations and detention at the prison camps. Publicly-available information shows that while Dr. James was the chief intelligence psychologist at Guantanamo, abuse in interrogations was widespread, and cruel and inhuman treatment was official policy.  

Allegations of abuse during Dr. James’s January to May 2003 deployment include beatings, religious and sexual humiliation, rape threats and painful forced body positions. Canadian citizen Omar Khadr, who is currently being tried by military commission at Guantanamo, is one of the prisoners who has alleged brutal treatment in the spring of 2003, when he was only 16 years old. James was also stationed in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison in 2004 and returned to Guantanamo in 2007.

As Chief Psychologist of the Joint Intelligence Group and a senior member of the Behavioral Science Consultation Team (BSCT) at Guantanamo, Dr. James, operating under his Louisiana license, also had access to the confidential medical records of people he was charged with exploiting for intelligence.

In compliance with her ethical obligation to report abuse by other psychologists, in February 2008 Dr. Bond filed a complaint against Dr. James before the Board, the agency that issued and regulates his Louisiana license. Dr. Bond alleged that Dr. James breached professional ethics by violating his duties to do no harm, to protect confidential information and to obtain informed consent.  She called on the Board to investigate and determine if action should be taken against Dr. James.  

The Board, charged with enforcing the state’s professional standards and conducting official investigations when unethical conduct is suspected, summarily refused to investigate Dr. Bond’s complaint, claiming that the statute of limitations had run, despite conclusive information to the contrary. Dr. Bond then filed suit against the Board in Louisiana’s 19th Judicial District Court, which in July 2009 dismissed her case without looking at the merits.

Attorneys argued today before the First Circuit Court in Baton Rouge that the District Court should have reviewed the Board’s incorrect legal decision.

Said Dr. Bond, “Dr. James’s job at Guantanamo was to advise interrogators on how to physically and emotionally break men and children. This was not only illegal, but a gross perversion of a healing art.  Psychologists, whether or not they’re in uniform, may not make a weapon out of their license to heal.”

Said CCR Cooperating Attorney Deborah Popowski, “The Louisiana psychology board has a legal duty to protect the public, and it failed to meet that obligation.  That it offered clearly erroneous grounds for its decision only adds insult to injury.  We believe the Court of Appeal will recognize the long-established role of Louisiana courts in checking an agency when it goes so far astray.”

Said Loyola University law professor Davida Finger, “The risk of harm to vulnerable populations in Louisiana could be great if courts leave patients with no remedy when professional boards refuse to investigate credible complaints of misconduct.”

On February 22 of this year, Professor Davida Finger of Loyola University New Orleans College of Law filed an amicus brief on behalf of New Orleans-based organizations the Institute of Women and Ethnic Studies and the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, as well as the national groups Psychologists for Social Responsibility, Psychoanalysis for Social Responsibility, and Psychologists for an Ethical APA.

CCR has led the legal battle over Guantanamo for the last eight years – sending the first ever habeas attorney to the base and sending the first attorney to meet with a former CIA “ghost detainee” there. CCR has been responsible for organizing and coordinating more than 500 pro bono lawyers across the country in order to represent the men at Guantanamo, ensuring that nearly all have the option of legal representation. In addition, CCR has been working to resettle the approximately 50 men who remain at Guantánamo because they cannot return to their country of origin for fear of persecution and torture.

Larry James, JTF-GTMO 2008

State Psychology Board Challenged over Refusal to Investigate Alleged Ethical Violations by Dr. Larry James

October 15, 2009, Baton Rouge, La. and New York -  Attorneys filed an appeal before the Louisiana First Circuit Court of Appeal, in the case Dr. Trudy Bond v. Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists. Toledo-based psychologist Dr. Trudy Bond is calling on the Louisiana State Board of Examiners to investigate Louisiana psychologist and retired U.S. Army colonel Dr. Larry C. James, a former high-ranking advisor on interrogations for the U.S. military in Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib.

According to his own statements, Dr. James played an influential role in both the policy and day-to-day operations of interrogations and detention at the prison camps.  Publicly-available information shows that while Dr. James was at Guantanamo, abuse in interrogations was widespread, and cruel and inhuman treatment was official policy.

Allegations of abuse during Dr. James’s January to May 2003 deployment include beatings, religious and sexual humiliation, rape threats and painful body positions. Canadian citizen Omar Khadr, who is still imprisoned in Guantanamo, is one of the prisoners who has alleged brutal treatment in the spring of 2003, when he was only 16 years old. James was also stationed in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison in 2004 and returned to Guantanamo in 2007. In 2008, he was named Dean of the School of Professional Psychology at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio.

In compliance with her ethical obligation to report abuse by other psychologists, in February 2008 Dr. Bond filed a complaint against Dr. James before the Board, the agency that issued and now regulates his psychology license. Dr. Bond alleged that Dr. James breached professional ethics by violating psychologists’ duties to do no harm, to protect confidential information and to obtain informed consent, and she called on the Board to investigate whether action should be taken against Dr. James.

As Chief Psychologist of the Joint Intelligence Group and a senior member of the Behavioral Science Consultation Team (BSCT) at Guantanamo, Dr. James had access to the confidential medical records of people he was charged with exploiting for intelligence. According to former Guantanamo interrogators, BSCTs used information from patients’ records to help interrogators increase the patients’ psychological duress, including by exploiting their fears. The very purpose of these mental health professional teams, the interrogators said, was to help “break” the prisoners. Dr. James denies that claim, but an extensive government paper trail supports the interrogators’ accounts.

The Board summarily refused to investigate Dr. Bond’s complaint, claiming that the statute of limitations had run, despite conclusive information to the contrary. Dr. Bond then filed suit against the Board in Louisiana’s 19th Judicial District Court, which in July 2009 dismissed her case without looking at the merits. Today’s brief before the First Circuit Court in Baton Rouge argues that the District Court should have reviewed the Board’s clearly wrong legal decision.

Said Dr. Bond, “The five psychologists on the Louisiana Board were given plenty of credible evidence, but they chose not to investigate the head intelligence psychologist of prison camps notorious for their use of psychological torture.  I don’t think Louisiana lawmakers intended to give five fellow professionals total, unchecked power to make arbitrary decisions that deeply affect the public welfare.”

Said CCR Cooperating Attorney Deborah Popowski, “The Louisiana Board is fighting awfully hard to turn a blind eye to serious allegations of abuse.  We wish the Board would devote its resources to investigating unethical conduct instead. Everyone, including the people of Louisiana, would be better served.”

CCR has led the legal battle over Guantanamo for the last six years – sending the first ever habeas attorney to the base and sending the first attorney to meet with a former CIA “ghost detainee” there. CCR has been responsible for organizing and coordinating more than 500 pro bono lawyers across the country in order to represent the men at Guantanamo, ensuring that nearly all have the option of legal representation. In addition, CCR has been working to resettle the approximately 60 men who remain at Guantánamo because they cannot return to their country of origin for fear of persecution and torture.

CONTACT: press@ccrjustice.org

RESOURCES

Bond v. Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists

• Bond Appeal Brief
• Earlier court documents
• Media backgrounder
• Timeline of events

Call for War Crimes Investigation

• Letter to the Canadian Minister of Public Safety
• Letter sent to James H. Bray, President of the American Psychological Association

Evidence

• List of documents supporting call for investigation
  
• Documents supporting call for investigation

Larry James, JTF-GTMO 2008

Legal Battle Continues Against Louisiana Psychology Board for Refusing to Investigate Professional Misconduct Allegations Against Dr. Larry James

August 6, 2009, Ottawa and New York – Human rights organizations are calling on the Canadian government to investigate retired U.S. Army colonel and psychologist Dr. Larry C. James, a former high-ranking advisor on interrogations for the U.S. military in Guantanamo Bay. According to his own statements, Dr. James played an influential role in both the policy and day-to-day operations of interrogations and detention at the base. Publicly-available information suggests that while Dr. James was at Guantanamo in the spring of 2003, abuse in interrogations was widespread and cruel treatment was official policy.

Responding to reports that he would travel to Toronto this week, the Canadian Centre for International Justice (CCIJ) and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) sent a joint letter yesterday to Canada’s Minister of Public Safety requesting an investigation into whether Dr. James had a role in war crimes or torture at Guantanamo Bay in 2003. Dr. James, who currently serves as the President of the American Psychological Association’s Division 19 for Military Psychology is expected to attend the APA’s Convention beginning today in Toronto.

Also today, a motion for appeal was filed in Louisiana, in the case Dr. Trudy Bond v. Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists (LSBEP). In compliance with her ethical obligation to report abuse by other psychologists, Dr. Bond, a Toledo-based psychologist, filed a complaint against Dr. James before the LSBEP, the agency that issued and now regulates his psychology license. Dr. Bond alleged that Dr. James breached professional ethics by violating psychologists’ duties to obtain informed consent, to protect confidential information and to do no harm. As Chief Psychologist of the Joint Intelligence Group and a senior member of the Behavioral Science Consultation Team (BSCT) at Guantanamo, Dr. James had access to the confidential medical records of people he was charged with exploiting for intelligence. Reports issued after his departure alleged that BSCTs used information from patients’ records to help identify physical and mental vulnerabilities of detainees for the purposes of interrogation. Dr. James denies that claim.

Following the LSBEP’s summary dismissal of the complaint without investigation, Dr. Bond filed suit against the LSBEP in Louisiana’s 19^th Judicial District Court, which dismissed her case last month. Today’s motion signals Dr. Bond’s intention to continue her pursuit of accountability at the state appellate level.

Allegations of abuse during Dr. James’ January to May 2003 deployment include beatings, religious and sexual humiliation, rape threats and painful body positions. Canadian citizen Omar Khadr is one of the prisoners who has alleged brutal treatment in the spring of 2003 when he was only 16 years old.

Based on this information, the CCIJ and CCR called on the Canadian government to investigate whether action should be taken against Dr. James or other attendees of the APA Convention who may have been involved in abuse of detainees.

The organizations have appealed to Canadian officials because the United States government, despite the change in administration, has failed to take proper steps to investigate people in positions of military, intelligence and political leadership who may have been involved in crimes related to the torture and abuse of detainees.

Canada’s Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act gives the federal government power to prosecute war crimes regardless of where they were committed if the alleged perpetrator is later present in Canada. A similar provision of the Criminal Code applies to crimes of torture.

Said CCIJ Legal Coordinator Matt Eisenbrandt, “Any time there is credible information that someone on Canadian soil may have been involved in torture or war crimes, the Canadian government should investigate. The fact that a Canadian citizen says he was abused during the time Dr. James was at Guantanamo only makes the case stronger for the government to conduct a full inquiry into the evidence.”

Said CCR Fellow Deborah Popowski, “”The Louisiana Board should investigate Larry James to find out whether he hurt people using the license it issued him to heal. No one can afford to ignore evidence that a psychologist may have been complicit in torture. When politics trump the rule of law, everyone suffers: survivors of torture, the health profession, and all patients.”

James was also stationed in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison in 2004 and returned to Guantanamo in 2007.

For more information on the involvement of health professionals in torture and abuse visit the Center for Constitutional Rights website www.whenhealersharm.org.

The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change.

The Canadian Centre for International Justice/Centre Canadian pour la justice internationale (www.ccij.ca) is a charitable organization that works with survivors of genocide, torture and other atrocities to seek redress and bring perpetrators to justice.

CONTACT: press@ccrjustice.org

RESOURCES

• The CCR/CCIJ letter to the Canadian Minister of Public Safety
• Cover letter sent to James H. Bray, President of the American Psychological Association
• Media backgrounder on Larry James and the Bond vs. Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists case
• List of sources on Larry James, also available as a single PDF document
• Court documents on Bond vs. Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists
• Timeline of events: Bond vs. LSBEP

[B6, B4, B1, C1, D3] Dates: June 2002—mid-January 2003

[B1, C1, D3] Position: Behavioral Science Consultation Team (BSCT) psychologist with the Interrogation Control Element (ICE) of JTF-GTMO.

[B6, B4, B1, C1, D3]

Reported Involvement: Dr. John Leso was the first BSCT psychologist at Guantánamo Bay Naval Base (GTMO), and while in this role, he participated in the torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment [A1, B4, D2, B13] of Mohammed al Qahtani. [A1, B1, B5] A DoD log of the interrogation of Mr. al Qahtani shows that Dr. Leso observed at least two abusive interrogation sessions and, on at least one occasion, advised the interrogators on how to increase Mr. al Qahtani’s suffering.[B4]

It is not yet publicly known whether he participated in other sessions in which Mr. al Qahtani was abused, but draft BSCT policies and statements by his colleagues suggest that the question warrants further investigation. [B7, D5, D6]

Also worthy of further investigation is the question of whether, as a BSCT charged with supporting the GTMO task force’s interrogation mission, Dr. Leso participated in the interrogation of other detainees during his time at GTMO. [B7, D1, C1] This question is vital to determine whether he was involved in the abusive treatment of other men and boys interrogated at GTMO between June 2002 and January 2003. [D5, A2, B12]

Additionally, Dr. Leso – a clinical psychologist with no training in interrogation prior to arriving at GTMO – helped craft a policy of torture at GTMO by designing psychologically and physically abusive interrogation techniques and detention conditions. Together with psychiatrist Dr. Paul Burney, Dr. Leso co-wrote a draft interrogation policy memo for GTMO that incorporated illegal techniques adapted from methods used by the Chinese and North Korean governments against American prisoners of war. Their memo eventually formed the basis for a memo signed by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in December 2, 2002, in which the Secretary authorized at least eleven abusive interrogation techniques that were similar or identical to the ones presented by Drs. Leso and Burney. [B1, B6, B8, B9, B10, B11, B6] Many of the techniques and conditions that Dr. Leso helped put in place were applied to Mr. al Qahtani [B4, B1] and many of the men and boys held at GTMO. [B1, D5] Eventually, similar techniques were also used on prisoners held in Department of Defense custody in Iraq and Afghanistan. [B1]

To date, no criminal, civil, administrative or professional ethics sanctions have been imposed on Dr. Leso.

The Psychologist: Dr. John Leso is a clinical psychologist who was sent to GTMO to provide care to U.S. personnel suffering from deployment-related stress. Prior to deploying to Cuba with the Army’s 85th Medical Detachment Combat Stress Control Team from Fort Hood, Texas, [B1, C1] Dr. Leso had no training related to interrogation. He had worked in the Department of Psychology at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. under the supervision of Dr. Larry C. James. [E1, E2, D3, C1] He received a Ph.D. in counseling psychology from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Albany, [B1, E1, E2] and he completed his doctoral training with a residency at Bellevue Hospital in New York City, where he specialized in bilingual psychotherapy and assessment. [E2] In January 2003, Dr. James replaced him as the GTMO BSCT psychologist, and Dr. Leso returned to Walter Reed to assume the role of Chief of Clinical Psychology. [E2] By August 2005, he had left D.C. for the U.S. Embassy in Austria. [E2] As recently as 2007, he was reported to be stationed at Fort Rucker, Alabama, home to the Army Aviation’s Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape (SERE) school. [E4] Whether he is currently a SERE psychologist is not publicly known. If he is, then his tasks could include ensuring that SERE trainers (mock interrogators) do not cause military trainees (mock captives) lasting harm.

The issuing authority for Dr. Leso’s license to practice as a psychologist is the New York State Office of the Professions. He holds an active license in New York state (#013492, issued in May 1998), where he is registered to practice through July 31, 2012. [E3] Dr. Leso is also a member of the American Psychological Association (APA).

Criminal Investigation/Sanction: None.

NY Professional Misconduct Investigation/Sanction: None. A psychologist filed a complaint against Dr. Leso on April 5, 2007 with the NY State Education Department’s Office of Professional Discipline. The Director of Investigations rejected the complaint via telephone claiming that the office lacked jurisdiction over the matter, without reference to any law or regulation in support of the Office’s decision. On February 29, 2008, the complainant asked for a written decision stating that NYOPD would not investigate. To date, NYOPD has not responded.

APA Investigation/Sanction: None. At least four complaints have been filed before the Ethics Committee of the APA.

Public Accountability: Health professionals, human rights groups and other concerned individuals have organized behind efforts by NY state legislators Richard Gottfried and Tom Duane to amend New York law to make it easier to sanction New York-licensed health professionals for torture and abuse, wherever the conduct occurs. While we believe that Dr. Leso’s conduct in particular is prohibited by existing NY law, CCR hopes that the Gottfried-Duane Anti-Torture bill, by bringing NY law in line with international norms and professional standards will help deter such conduct, protect health professionals who refuse to obey unlawful orders and send a clear message to the NY disciplinary boards of their duty under the law.

See detailed evidence here.