DOJ Memo Allowed Severe, But Short-Term, Mental Pain in Interrogations
Posted 49 minutes ago
By Debra Cassens Weiss

Newly released documents confirm that a secret Justice Department memo authorized waterboarding by the Central Intelligence Agency in 2002, according to a press release by the American Civil Liberties Union. The memo allowed harsh interrogation techniques causing severe mental pain that is not long-lasting.

The August 2002 Justice Department memo (PDF) was released as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. The previously undisclosed document concludes U.S. law permits interrogation methods that cause severe mental pain as long as they do not cause “harm lasting months or even years after the acts were inflicted upon the prisoners.” The memo was signed by then-Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, now a federal appeals judge.

The memo says the assessment of mental harm should take into account the psychological health of the subject. “The healthier the individual, the less likely that the use of any one procedure or set of procedures as a course of conduct will result in prolonged mental harm,” the memo says. Large parts of the document are blacked out and the sections that are revealed do not specifically mention waterboarding.

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