CIA employees will not be charged with prisoner deaths News
CIA employees will not be charged with prisoner deaths

[JURIST] The New York Times reported Sunday that federal prosecutors reviewing the involvement of CIA [official website; JURIST news archive] officials in the deaths of at least four prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan have decided not to bring criminal charges against all but one CIA employee. The US Justice Department [official website; JURIST news archive] believes the US military bears most of the blame for prisoner deaths. Contract worker David Passaro [Raleigh News-Observer report] appears to be the only person linked to the CIA who was involved in deaths of prisoners, although Passaro insists he has been scapegoated for political reasons. Another case technically still under review by the Justice Department involves an Iraqi who died during CIA interrogation in a shower room at Abu Ghraib [JURIST news archive]. The Justice Department will not pursue two additional cases involving the hypothermia of an Afghan at a detention center in November, 2002 and the death of a former Iraqi general [JURIST report] who succumbed to asphyxiation after his head was stuffed into a sleeping bag at an American base in western Iraq. AFP has more.