Taxi to the Dark Side Page #4

But it quickly "evolved". And when you walked in there,

They just had a pair of long handcuffs dangling from the wire mesh ceiling of the cell.

Ready for whoever came in.

Manner of Death:
Homicide

The Army Coroner who examined Dilawar discovered massive tissue damage in his legs.

She later testified that his legs had been pulpified.

But what could have caused that kind of damage?

In a videotape that surfaced as part of the homicide investigation,

Colonel David Hayden, the top Army lawyer for U.S. Forces in Afgan,

described a policy of shackling and striking detainees.

[SGT. Thomas Curtis, Mil-Pol, Bagram] I didn't actually hear a higher-up say,

"Go and kick them in the leg if they do this and they do that."

But the higher-ups said, "In order to get control of them,

That's an option that you can use."

[PFC. Willie Brand, Mil-Pol, Bagram] It's just your knee going into the side of their thigh about mid-way up.

There's supposed to be a pressure point right there. And it controls them really easy.

[Tim Golden, New York Times Reporter] Throughout the investigation, and even in the trials,

a lot of the guards and interrogators described Dilawar as a very combative detainee, as a tough character.

And that's just never been reconciled with all the other evidence that there was about this guy.

He weighed 122 pounds when he died.

The men who had been passengers in Dilawar's taxi told us later

that he had just been absolutely terrified at Bagram.

That they heard him through the walls of the isolation cells screaming for his mother and father.

[Moazzam Begg, British subject detained at Bagram and Guantanamo 2002-2005] He'd been in a very uncomfortable position

muttering some things, sometimes praying, sometimes asking for help,

Or seemingly asking for help, because I couldn't understand his language.

A number of witnesses remember the night before Dilawar died.

[SGT. Thomas Curtis, Mil-Pol, Bagram] Just that one night he got kicked in the leg, maybe like 10 times.

[Tim Golden, New York Times Reporter] Some of the soldiers said they started using the knee strikes essentially to shut them up,

Because he was yelling and screaming.

[SGT. Anthony Morden, Mil-Pol, Bagram] The damage that was done was done from multiple strikes.

And a lot of that could have been avoided had you known the person

before you had fought with them, and used that exact technique.

[Moazzam Begg, British subject detained at Bagram and Guantanamo 2002-2005] When they eventually came to take him to an isolation cell,

I believe his body had become almost limp.

One of the reasons why they began punching him was that they felt he was putting it on.

He was in the airlock standing there with a hood over his head.

He had his hands tied above his head, and he was moaning.

[SGT. Anthony Morden, Mil-Pol, Bagram] He started to fight right there in the airlock.

And the airlock has a front gate and a back gate.

but on both sides There is barbed wire. But both sides are concertina wire.

Neither of us officers wanted to get into the concertina wire.

So we pulled him out of the airlock and put him on the floor, and put him into restraints.

What kind of force did you have to use to subdue him?

[SGT. Anthony Morden, Mil-Pol, Bagram] Physical force. He was struck.

[SPC. Glendale Walls, Interrogated Dilawar at Bagram] There were like four MPs on this guy.

And one of the MPs just kept giving him kidney shots.

The other two, they'd slam him to the ground.

And then the fourth one like jumped on his back.

He got a big gash on his nose.

[Moazzam Begg, British subject detained at Bagram and Guantanamo 2002-2005] There was no reason to hit him. Remember, he was shackled.

[SGT. Thomas Curtis, Mil-Pol, Bagram] Even when control wasn't an issue, it became "Well, I'm just going to do this to get mine in."

And that's probably why they got in trouble.

Because you really couldn't justify kicking the guy that much if he was just chained up.

Dilawar was taken to an isolation cell where the knee strikes continued.

In her statement at trial, the Army Coroner said his lower limbs

looked like they had been run over by a bus.

Had he lived, it would have been necessary to amputate his legs.

[PFC. Willie Brand, Mil-Pol, Bagram] Then it kind of raised the question of like,

"This is what we did to him." It's not just like this is what I did to him,

or this is what Cammie did to him, or Morden or anybody. Just, "This is what we've done."

[Tim Golden, New York Times Reporter] It's almost hard to fathom now.

You had soldiers like Willie Brand who seems like this very gentle, kind of soft-spoken guy,

But who testified that he struck Dilawar so many times in the leg that his knee got tired,

and he had to switch to the other one.

[SGT. Anthony Morden, Mil-Pol, Bagram] Sometimes I feel that I should have gone with my own morality

more than what was common.

One MP testified that the strikes became an amusement inflicted on Dilawar just to hear him scream "Allah."

[SGT. Thomas Curtis, Mil-Pol, Bagram] Some would say, "Well, hey, you should have stopped this. You should have stopped that

When you saw he was injured, or saw he was being kicked on this...

Why didn't you do something?" That would be a good question!

And my answer would be, "Well, you know, it was us against them."

I was over there. I didn't want to appear to be going against my fellow soldiers.

Which...is that wrong? You could sit here and say that was dead wrong.

Go over there and say that!

No one ever investigated who set the rules at Bagram.

Investigators never asked Capt. Wood what senior officers

had given orders to treat detainees in ways that were forbidden according to the Army Field Manual.

MP Capt. Beiring was the only officer prosecuted in the case.

His dereliction of duty charge was dismissed when the judge determined

That no one had made clear what Capt. Beiring's duty was.

In spite of repeated requests for proper training, rules of engagement for his soldiers,

His superiors gave him neither.

[SPC. Glendale Walls, 519th Mil-Intel, Interrogated Dilawar at Bagram] We were all worried about not having that written guidelines.

But they kept reassuring us that it was coming.

[PFC. Damien Corsetti, Mil-Intel, Bagram] We knew exactly why we weren't getting clear guidance,

just in case something like this happened.

[SPC. Glendale Walls, 519th Mil-Intel, Interrogated Dilawar at Bagram] If I had to do it again, I'd probably say "No."

I'm not doing anything until I see something in writing.

Do you think that looking back, you think you were misled?

[SPC. Glendale Walls, 519th Mil-Intel, Interrogated Dilawar at Bagram] I think we all were.

A week after September 11th, Vice-President Dick Cheney appeared on Meet the Press

to describe how interrogation policies were about to change.

PAY BACK:

[Vice-President Dick Cheney] They have to work so that the Dark Side, if you will.

We've got to spend time in the shadows in the Intelligence World.

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