Torture In Prisons

Colleen Carroll

Mr. Henley

English Composition 1113, Section 1

26 April 2017

Topic: Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Prisoner Torture: Legal and Ethical or Not?

Thesis: Captured persons have historically been inappropriately tortured by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), but this is not legal and should not occur.

Annotated Bibliography

Abdel-Monem, Tarik. “Precedent of the European Convention on Human Rights to the CIA'S High Value Detainees Program in and through Europe.” Suffolk Transnational Law Review, vol. 31, no. 1, 2007. Questia School, www.questiaschool.com/read/1G1 179076803/precedent-of-the-european-convention-on-human-rights. Accessed 2017.

The article outlines specific interrogation methods applied to prisoners of the CIA.

However, the European Convention on Human Rights constitutes these methods as torture. In general, the CIA believes that torture is an effective method for extracting important information from supposed terrorists, and interrogations often take place in third world countries at undisclosed sites. Some of these methods include food and water deprivation; sleep deprivation; hooding, or placing a hood over the entire head; prolonged standing; the cold cell, or hypothermic cells nakedness and cold water; waterboarding, or controlled drowning; beatings; exposure to loud sounds; and other violations of human rights. Moreover, a variety of countries, including European countries, participate in these CIA activities, and it is reported that Jordan is the most effective in obtaining confessions. Nonetheless, even though the United States of America refuses to support or even acknowledge the CIA’s torture tactics, the European Convention on Human Rights has heard numerous cases involving such CIA behavior and has even deemed some of them illegal. The main limitation of this article is the lack of evidence to support claims by supposed CIA captives. Thus, this article is useful for evaluating illegal CIA practices but not prisoner accounts.
Luban, David. “Torture and the Professions.” Criminal Justice Ethics, vol. 26, no. 2, 2007, p. 2. Questia School, www.questiaschool.com/read/1G1-202802826/torture-and-the- professions. Accessed 2017.
In this article, Luban addresses the debate of the legality of torture in the United States of America and the reasons why the United States is a culture of torture. The author’s main argument is that the definition of torture is an intentional infliction of severe physical or mental pain or suffering, and it is illegal according to the Convention Against Torture. However, cruel, inhuman, and degrading acts (CID) are not precisely defined as torture and are not labeled as a crime but are illegal. Furthermore, the Geneva Conventions, effective in the United States, outlaw torture as well as cruel and degrading treatment. Nonetheless, the CIA and the United States army have leaked details of the cold cell, waterboarding, prolonged standing, sleep deprivation, isolation, extended interrogations, sexual and other humiliation tactics, and high volume music used in interrogations; additionally, there are several deaths linked to the CIA that the CIA has not denied. Hence, the author details the government’s arguments against torture use through its own lawyers, anthropologists, psychologists, and doctors. The theories and evidence in this article are quite formal, effective, and credible. In particular, this article will assist in detailing the legal aspects involving torture and CID.
McDonnell, Mary-Hunter Morris, et al. “Torture in the Eyes of the Beholder: The Psychological Difficulty of Defining Torture in Law and Policy.” Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, vol. 44, no. 1, 2011, pp. 87+. Questia School, www.questiaschool.com /read/1G1- 250578537/torture-in-the-eyes-of-the-beholder-the-psychological. Accessed 2017.
The authors employ an in-depth definition of torture throughout the article and describes the psychological impact of torture through experiments. The main idea expressed acknowledges that torture is illegal according to several laws and other policies. However, the article follows that not all treatment of prisoners employed by the United States of America is truly torture. In fact, hooding, prolonged standing, exposure to loud noises, starvation, and sleep deprivation were not found to be classified as torture in Ireland v. United Kingdom because they do not involve the extreme pain of what is defined as true torture. Simply, the United States of America employs a more tolerant attitude in relation to interrogation techniques. Nevertheless, when government officials feel that national security is threatened, the article conveys that they are more likely to have an indifferent or laxed attitude towards what constitutes as torture; thus, due to this attitude, their interrogation and torture policies will become more conservative. The authors provide a strong and logical stance relating to torture. Furthermore, because the information is up-to-date and from a reliable source, it will effectively support the thesis.
O'Brien, Ed. “Torture and the War on Terror.” Social Education, vol. 68, no. 7, 2004, pp. 453+. Questia School, www.questiaschool.com/read/1G1-126015029/torture-and-the-war-on- terror. Accessed 2017.
In this article, O’Brien reviews torture utilized in the war on terror at prisons in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo Bay.

Support for these claims is thoroughly documented through definitions and other facts. However, the author’s research mainly focuses on events that took place during the Bush administration at classified CIA prisons to obtain important information in the war on terror. The treatment of the captives in these prisons has been classified as torture, yet President George Bush Jr. denies any use of or support of torture because the United States of America signed the Geneva Convention Treaty that outlawed torture. The methods reported to be used include isolation, nudity, extreme temperatures, starvation, stress positions, hooding, and threatening by dogs. Even though, torture is only classified as pain equal to the loss of a bodily organ or body function loss or death, several deaths have been reported in circumstances of torture or degrading and cruel treatment. These circumstances prompt the author to view torture and its legality in a negative light. Throughout the piece, the author uses credible statistics and actual situations that sufficiently support his stance. This article is relevant to the thesis due to the sufficient supporting evidence of

torture.
Roth, Kenneth. “Torture in the War on Terror: Kenneth Roth Reviews Protecting Liberty in an Age of Terror.” Harvard International Review, vol. 28, no. 2, 2006, pp. 80+. Questia School, www.questiaschool.com/read/1G1-149521005/torture-in-the-war-on-terror- kenneth-roth-reviews. Accessed 2017.
This article examines the United States of America’s use of torture in the war on terrorism.

The author’s research focuses on Harvard professors Philip B. Heymann and Juliette N. Kayyem’s book Protecting Liberty in an Age of Terror. This book supports banning torture and CID through authorization by the President of the United States. However, even though the two professors believe that the use of torture can be minimalized, Roth does not trust that the president can decrease the instances of torture. Roth goes on to detail how the Bush administration refused to support torture, but they narrowly defined it so that only pain similar to the loss of a bodily organ constituted as torture. Similarly, Israel permitted the use of slight physical pressure, which the author defines as a situation of CID that morphs into torture. Moreover, Roth criticizes the Bush administration’s detention of American citizens and other non-Americans in prisons such as Guantanamo Bay without probable cause or sufficient evidence. In general, the author’s use of a critical tone when analyzing of the Bush administration make him less credible. Overall, this article will support the thesis that claims the practice of torture is unethical and

illegal.
Welch, Michael. “Illusions in Truth Seeking: The Perils of Interrogation and Torture in the War on Terror.” Social Justice, vol. 37, no. 2-3, 2010, pp. 123+. Questia School, www. questiaschool.com/read/1G1-266218092/illusions-in-truth-seeking-the-perils-of- interrogation. Accessed 2017.
Welch’s purpose is to challenge the legality of torture. More specifically, he has conducted a thorough investigation of torture through laws, definitions, and recent utilization in the Bush administration. While it is reported that the usage of enhanced interrogation methods, or simply torture, are the most effective way to obtain significant information regarding the war on terrorism, the current methods employed by the CIA are, in fact, illegal. The methods listed include waterboarding, sensory overload, extreme temperature use, humiliation, sleep deprivation, stress positions, isolation, striking, and shaking among others. However, tactics such as these can produce lasting physical and psychological issues as evidenced by the detailed description of injuries related to such treatment. Similarly, the third degree, which includes mental or physical suffering to obtain a confession, was used by police departments of the 1930’s and was like the CIA’s torture. Nevertheless, more advanced and less harmful interrogation techniques are now in place. In short, Welch successfully defines the reemergence of the third degree in the CIA, yet its threat is overlooked due to the careful monitoring of medical professionals. There is sufficient credible supporting evidence throughout. The article and the author’s in-depth analysis is relevant to the thesis.
Wynia, Matthew K. “Laying the Groundwork for a Defense against Participation in Torture?” The Hastings Center Report, vol. 38, no. 1, 2008, pp. 11+. Questia School, www.questia school.com/read/1G1-187426912/laying-the-groundwork-for-a-defense-against participation. Accessed 2017.
The author thoroughly describes the torture tactic of waterboarding, which is controlled drowning that induces panic, and whether it is legal. The main ideas expressed document many historical cases of waterboarding that have been prosecuted in times of war and during postwar tribunals. In fact, because torture has been illegal for over 200 years, cases of waterboarding have been prosecuted since 1898. However, even though laws, such as Article III of the Geneva Convention, forbid torture as well as cruel and degrading treatment, it has been practiced by the CIA since at least 2001. Moreover, waterboarding is one of the most common interrogation methods. However, it can be ineffective because military personal can be trained to withstand torture; thus, the interrogators can receive false information. Furthermore, waterboarding is so dangerous that the procedure requires a physician present to monitor the amount of water ingested. Therefore, the law and physicians should not allow the continuance of waterboarding as in the Bush administration. Briefly, the main limitation of the article is the author’s investigation of solely waterboarding and not multiple torture techniques. Nonetheless, this article is useful for the research topic because it investigates the dangers and legality of waterboarding.