Evidence: John Leso

July 23rd, 2009 | Related to Evidence: John Leso, Resources

A. Survivor/Attorney Testimony

A1. Declaration by Mohammed al Qahtani’s attorney, Gitanjali Gutierrez (German War Crimes Complaint against Rumsfeld, et al.)
Date: November 2006

A2. CCR Report: Torture and Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment of Prisoners at Guantanamo Bay
Date: July 2006

B. Government Records

B1. Senate Armed Services Committee Report: Inquiry into the Treatment of Detainees in U.S. Custody
Date: November 20, 2008
Pages: 39, 40, 45-47, 50-52, 61-62, 66-70, 88, 94-97

The bipartisan Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) approved its now public report in November 2008, during the Bush administration. SASC concluded, among other things, that

[t]he abuse of detainees in U.S. custody cannot simply be attributed to the actions of ‘a few bad apples’ acting on their own. The fact is that senior officials in the United States government solicited information on how to use aggressive techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance of their legality, and authorized their use against detainees. Those efforts damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority.

B2. Senate Armed Services Committee Hearing: Testimony of Diane Beaver
Date: June 17, 2008
Pages: 67-68 (morning)

B3. U.S. Army Inspector General: Army Regulation 15-6: Final Report (”Schmidt-Furlow Report”)
Date: June 9, 2005
Pages: 13-21

B4. Secret Orcon, Interrogation Log, Detainee 063
Date: November 23, 2002—January 11, 2003
Pages: 1-3, 11-13, 18-20, 30-31, 58-60, 66-67

This interrogation log chronicles the abusive treatment of Mohammed al Qahtani (noted as Detainee 063) and was published by TIME magazine on June 12, 2005. The 83-page document notes the presence of Dr. Leso as MAJ L (BSCT) on November 23, 2002 and November 27, 2002. The presence of a member of the three-person BSCT team is noted in the entries for 2 December, 2002; 11 December, 2002; 25 December, 2002; and 29 December, 2002. In a press release issued on the same day, the Department of Defense acknowledges the authenticity of the leaked log.

B5. DoD News Release 592-05: Guantanamo Provides Valuable Intelligence Information
Date: June 12, 2005

B6. Email between DoD CITF Personnel: FW: Counter Resistance Strategy Meeting Minutes
Date: October 2, 2002

B7. DoD JTF GTMO-BSCT: BSCT Standard Operating Procedures
Date: November 11, 2002

Footnote 277 on p39 of the 2008 SASC report notes that it is not publicly known whether this draft SOP was actually approved.

B8. Memo from Lt. Col. Jerald Phifer to JTF 170 Commander MG Michael Dunlavey
Date: October 11, 2002
Subject: Request for Approval of Counter-Resistance Strategies

B9. Memo from MG Michael Dunlavey to USSOUTHCOM Commander GEN James Hill
Date: October 11, 2002
Subject: Counter-Resistance Strategies

B10. Memo from GEN James Hill to Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff GEN Richard Myers
Date: October 25, 2002
Subject: Counter-Resistance Techniques

B11. Action Memo from William J. Haynes III to Sec. of Def. Donald Rumsfeld
Date: November 27, 2002 (approved by Rumsfeld on December 2, 2002)
Subject: Counter-Resistance Techniques

B12. FBI email about abusive interrogation techniques

B13. Letter from T. J. Harrington, Deputy Assistant Director, Counterterrorism to Major General Donald J. Ryder, DOA Criminal Investigation Command
Date: July 14, 2004
Subject: Suspected Mistreatment of detainees

C. Unofficial Accounts by Government Agents

C1. Fixing Hell: An Army Psychologist Confronts Abu Ghraib
Date: 2008
Authors: Col. (ret.) Larry C. James (and Gregory A. Freeman)
Pages: 4-23, 27-30, 38, 269-271

D. Secondary Sources

D1. Torture Team
Date: 2008
Author: Philippe Sands
Pages: 125, 127-128, 233

D2. Washington Post: Detainee Tortured, Says U.S. Official
Date: January 14, 2009
Reporter: Bob Woodward

D3. ProPublica: Tortured Profession: Psychologists Warned of Abusive Interrogations, Then Helped Craft Them
Date: May 5, 2009 (updated May 7, 2009)
Reporter: Sheri Fink

D4. New England Journal of Medicine: Doctors and Interrogators at Guantánamo Bay
Date: July 7, 2005 (Volume 353 at 6-8)
Authors: M. Gregg Bloche and Jonathan H. Marks

D5. New York Times: Red Cross Finds Detainee Abuse in Guantanamo
Date: November 30, 2004
Reporter: Neil Lewis

The New York Times reported that a 2004 International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) document referenced another ICRC report from January 2003, in which the organization “raised questions of whether ‘psychological torture’ was taking place.” The date of the January 2003 report suggest that its conclusions would likely relate at least in part to the period of Dr. Leso’s tenure at Guantanamo, from June 2002 through January 2003. Neither of the reports has been made public.

D6. Associated Press: Red Cross complains to U.S. on Guantanamo
Date: Nov. 30, 2004

According to the Associated Press, the ICRC would not confirm or deny the information regarding the Nov. 2004 New York Times article. However, a Pentagon spokesperson reportedly confirmed that the ICRC had previously informed the U.S. government of its concerns that indefinite detention was torture. U.S. official reportedly rejected the ICRC’s criticism.

D7. American Journal of Bioethics: Medical Ethics and the Interrogation of Guantanamo 063
Date: April 2007 (Volume 7, Number 3 at 1-7)
Author: Steven H. Miles

D8. Time: Inside the Interrogation of Detainee 063
Date: June 12, 2005
Reporters: Adam Zagorin, Michael Duffy,

D9. New Yorker: The Experiment
Date: July 11, 2005
Reporter: Jane Mayer