Exporting Abuse?

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/Investigation/iraq_prison_wardens_040520-1.html

Wardens Chosen to Establish Iraq Prison System Had Past Abuse Allegations

May 20, 2004 — A number of former state prison commissioners chosen by the Bush administration to establish a prison system in Iraq left their old posts after allegations of neglect, brutality and inmate deaths, an investigation by ABCNEWS has found.

Last year, the former head of Utah's prison system, Lane McCotter, was hired by the U.S. government to help set up Iraq's new prison system and train guards.

He even led a tour of Abu Ghraib for U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who attended the reopening of the Baghdad prison.

But in 1997, guards at a Utah prison, then under McCotter's charge, made a videotape showing the abuse of Michael Valent, a mentally ill inmate who allegedly would not follow orders.

Inmate Kept in Restraints for Hours

Valent was stripped naked, marched down the halls and, under an approved procedure at the time, placed in a special restraint chair, where he was left for 16 hours.

"By the time he was finally released from that restraint chair, he developed blood clotting and, through a pulmonary embolism, died," said Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson.

more

http://www.newsroom-l.net/wolfowitz.htm

Wolfowitz toured Abu Ghraib "death house"

Lane McCotter briefing Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz during a tour of the death house at Abu Ghraib Prison, south of Bagdad. Left to right, Gary DeLand, Paul Wolfowitz, Lane McCotter.

[Eye and Monkey]

1. McCotter is a Mormon "local ecclesiastical representative"?

Googling McCotter, I found a site for a Mormon girl's camp that i.d.'s McCotter as a "local ecclesiastical representative", specifically one of three "Utah South Agent Stake Presidents".

http://www.hebervalleycamp.org/committee.html

[Spazito]

2. The media has turned a corner, imo...

this was too much even for them to let pass. The horrors perpetrated with the authorization of the bush cabal is out for the world to see, finally.

[NNN0LHI]

3. kick

[maddezmom]

4. more on McCotter and Armstrong from NYT

use of American corrections executives with abuse accusations in their past to oversee American-run prisons in Iraq is prompting concerns in Congress about how the officials were selected and screened.

Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, sent a letter yesterday to Attorney General John Ashcroft questioning what he described as the "checkered record when it comes to prisoners' rights" of John J. Armstrong, a former commissioner of corrections in Connecticut.

Mr. Armstrong resigned last year after Connecticut settled lawsuits brought by the American Civil Liberties Union and the families of two Connecticut inmates who died after being sent by Mr. Armstrong to a supermaximum security prison in Virginia. One of the inmates, a diabetic, died of heart failure after going into diabetic shock and then being hit with an electric charge by guards wielding a stun gun and kept in restraints.

In his letter, Mr. Schumer requested that the Justice Department conduct an investigation into the role of American civilians in the Iraqi prison system. Mr. Armstrong is assistant director of operations of American prisons in Iraq, and Mr. Schumer said he was apparently working under contract for the State Department
~snip~
more: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/21/politics/21PRIS.html?ex=1085716800&e...

[Disturbed]

5. Suitable sadists

Bushco hires sadists because they are suuitable for the job.

[Sean Reynolds]

6. I'm glad to see SLC's mayor, Rocky Anderson speaking out.

He's a good man and a good Democrat. Now if only ALL Democrats had his balls!