ACLU Urges Gates to Release Photos of Prisoner Abuse, Despite New Exemption Under FOIA

The ACLU is urging Department of Defense Secretary Robert Gates not to exercise the authority granted him under a Homeland Security appropriations bill signed by President Obama to continue suppressing photos of prisoner abuse. The amendment allows the DOD to exempt photos from the Freedom of Information Act.

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Loud Music as an Interrogation Technique

On behalf of the National Campaign to Close Guantanamo, the National Security Archive in Washington is filing a FOI request seeking classified records that detail the use of loud music as an interrogation device. 

The Associated Press reports that documents and interviews with former detainees reveal that music from AC/DC, Britney Spears, the Bee Gees, and Marilyn Manson was used to block communication between detainees.  Critics say the music was also used to humiliate, terrify, punish, disorient and deprive detainees of sleep, violating international law.  

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Evaluating the Senate's Passage of the Open FOIA Act

The Senate's passage of the Open FOIA Act presents a mixed bag.   It's disappointing that the Senate exempted photos showing detainee treatment under U.S. force's control, adding yet another exemption to the 240 already written into the law.  On the other hand, the bill requires the invocation of any future FOIA exemptions to cite the specific part of the act that permits them, making it easier to identify and debate those proposed exemptions.  

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Senate creates process to ban release of detainee photos

The Senate passed two FOIA-related amendments to the appropriation bill, The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press reported. The first "creates a process for the Secretary of Defense to certify to the president that the release of photos and videos taken between Sept. 11, 2001, and Jan. 22, 2009, of people captured by U.S. forces outside the United States would endanger lives." This would protect the photos from being released for at least three years. The second amendment requires new laws related to exemptions to specifically reference the FOIA.

The ACLU’s effort to get photos documenting the treatment of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan was halted by the Senate on Thursday night, in an amendment to the appropriations bill.

The Senate also agreed to require new laws that exempt information from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act to specifically reference the FOIA, making them easier for requesters to spot.

The two changes were part of the supplemental appropriations bill, which the House already passed. The House and Senate will now reconcile the two versions of the bill.

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In Rhode Island, Secrecy Plagues Immigration Detentions

Since the middle of last month, at least 84 suspected illegal immigrants have been arrested throughout Rhode Island, including two highly publicized mass arrests — one at state courthouses last week.

The arrests raise many questions.

Has the federal bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement targeted Rhode Island for a crackdown on illegal immigration? Exactly how many people have been arrested so far this year? Where are they being detained? And, are these stepped-up raids driven by Governor Carcieri’s executive order on illegal immigration?

Unlike other law enforcement agencies that are compelled to release such information, ICE often operates in secret, say lawyers, advocates for freedom of the press and civil libertarians.

Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, said the Rhode Island raids represent “the same story” as ACLU has experienced in past dealings with ICE.

“Many detainees end up in an impenetrable rabbit hole from Alice in Wonderland,” said Brown. “They are often impossible to find, ICE is often unable to tell family members where they are held — and then, when you finally find them, a chess game begins, where these detainees get transferred to distant places across the country.”

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