CIA's destruction of tapes likely to spur lawsuits

US detainees who had challenged the agency's harsh interrogations may claim obstruction of justice, attorneys say.

By Peter Grier | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

from the December 8, 2007 edition

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Washington - The Central Intelligence Agency's admission that it destroyed at least two videotapes of harsh interrogations of terror suspects has caused an uproar in Washington and seems almost certain to lead to legal challenges to the agency's actions.

The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee called for a full investigation of the matter, while the American Civil Liberties Union charged that the shredding of the tapes was more evidence of the Bush administration's long-term pattern of shielding government officials from criminal prosecution for torture and abuse.

"The destruction of these tapes suggests an utter disregard for the rule of law," said Jameel Jaffer, director of the ACLU's National Security Project.

News of the tapes broke at a time when the treatment of terror suspects was already a priority item on the US national agenda. House and Senate negotiators on Thursday reached agreement on legislation that would ban the use of waterboarding and other harsh techniques by CIA interrogators.

The ban, included in a spending authorization bill for US intelligence agencies, must still be passed in its final form by both chambers of Congress. The Bush administration has in the past threatened to veto similar legislation.

In addition, the US Supreme Court earlier this week heard arguments in a case dealing with the legal rights of detainees at the Guantánamo Bay prison camp in Cuba. At issue is whether the detainees have the right to challenge their imprisonment under the right of habeas corpus.

The startling news about the tapes became public on Thursday after The New York Times told the CIA it was preparing a story on the subject and CIA Director Michael Hayden sent a message to agency workers to prepare them for its publication.

The CIA destroyed two videos of suspect interrogations made in 2002 because it was afraid that keeping them "posed a security risk", Director Hayden wrote. "Were they ever to leak, they would permit identification of your CIA colleagues who had served in the [interrogation] program, exposing them and their families to retaliation from al-Qa'ida and its sympathizers."

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