At least twenty four confirmed dead, including eight children, and miles of devastation from the latest tornado system, which deleted a mile and a quarter wide swath of life and buildings in the south of Oklahoma City and Moore, Oklahoma. Rescue at Plaza Towers Elementary School in the Moore area has now been switched to recovery, as the teams working having found nobody left alive under the rubble of that school. At least seven children are confirmed dead at that school. Briarwood School was also destroyed.
Live ongoing video coverage is being provided by NBC, with helicopters in the air, including footage of the tornado.
From the linked article :
A preliminary report from the National Weather Service rated the storm as at least an EF4, the second-worst category, The Weather Channel reported. EF4 tornadoes have winds of 166 to 200 mph.
Some screenshots show the massive size of the storm, and some of the complete destruction of the area.
Thankfully, with the tales of loss and destruction, stories are emerging of teachers saving children by literally lying on top of them to keep them safe.
All children found are being brought to : St. Andrews Church : 119th & South May
The storm is not over. The Moore tornado is heading past Beaver Lake and heading toward Benton, Arkansas, and Branson, Missouri.
This new article at Huffington Post reviews senators who voted to restrict federal aid to those affected by Hurricane Sandy. It also includes a sad but amazing slideshow attached.
update : wednesday the death toll was adjusted, as people thought lost and dead were found alive … the death toll was reduced from fifty one to twenty four, and is reflected in an edit of this article
also, more screenshots and video have been and will continue to be added as they’re posted by people
Kern County Sheriffs’ Department
Sheriff
Donny Youngblood
1350 Norris Rd
Bakersfield, California 93308
(661)391-7500
http://www.kernsheriff.com
Unarmed Father of 4 David Sal Silva Beaten to death by 9 Kern County Officers
“I took the unprecedented step of asking the FBI to conduct a parallel investigation,” Youngblood told The Times. “Our credibility is at stake here.”
The seven deputies and two California Highway Patrol officers tried to take Silva into custody early Wednesday morning after law enforcement received a report of a possibly intoxicated man outside Kern Medical Center, according to the sheriff’s department.
Silva struggled with them, deputies said. A canine was deployed, batons were used and Silva, 33, was pronounced dead at KMC less than an hour later after experiencing trouble breathing.
Witnesses have said Silva appeared to die right in front of them, minutes after officers struck him several times with batons.
The coroner’s office, which reports to Sheriff Donny Youngblood, said Friday that the cause of death hasn’t been determined and is pending toxicology and microscopic studies. Those studies could take as long as four months.
Officers Involved
Sgt. Douglas Sword On Force > 13 1/2 years
Deputy David Stephens On Force > 5 1/2 years
Deputy Brian Brock On Force > 1 1/2 years
Deputy Luis Almanza On Force > 3 years
Deputy Jeffrey Kelly On Force > 4 years
Deputy Tanner Miller On Force > 4 1/2 years
Deputy Ryan Greer On Force > 4 1/2 years
On Monday May 13th, 2013 Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood requested the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) analyze the two cell phones seized pursuant to a search warrant related to the in custody death of David Silva. Specifically, Sheriff Youngblood requested the FBI conduct a forensic analysis of the contents of the cell phones. A request to the FBI was made following the preliminary results of the Bakersfield Police Department’s analysis of the phones. The analysis by the Bakersfield Police Department confirmed the existence of video footage related to this incident on one phone and no video footage on the second phone. This prompted the subsequent request for further analysis by the FBI. Sheriff Youngblood also requested the FBI conduct a parallel investigation into the circumstances surrounding this incident. Today, Sheriff’s Office personnel transported the phones to the FBI Sacramento Office for analysis.
UPDATE : The Kern County Sheriff’s Office has decided to postpone Law Enforcement Day at the Sheriff’s Office, which had been scheduled for Saturday May 18th. The Sheriff’s Office planned the event as a day for the community to tour our facility, view demonstrations from several of our specialized units such as the Bomb Squad and K-9 unit, and talk to the men and women who work for the Sheriff’s Office protecting the citizens of Kern County every day. Unfortunately due to recent events, the Sheriff’s Office felt it would be appropriate to postpone the event. The Sheriff’s Office apologizes to those community members who had planned on attending the event. The event will be re-scheduled in the future.
——————————————————————————————————————-
Sgt. DOUGLAS SWORD
Email: SwordD@co.kern.ca.us
Sgt. Doug and his wife Mary Sword live on 2120 Jason Street Bakersfield CA.
—————————————————————————————————————–
Officer Ryan Greer lives with wife Tarrah T Greer at
6901 Hooper Ave
Bakersfield , California 93308
661-391-3175
Property Information >
Estimated Value: $261,900
Monthly Value Change: $4,000
Last Updated: 04/22/2013
Bedroom(s): 4
Bathroom(s): 2.75
Square Feet: 2,634
Property Type: Single Family Home
Year Built: 1972
Monthly Est. Mortgage: $1,190
Monthly Est. Insurance: $76
Monthly Property Tax: $269
Price Per SqFt: $99
Last Sold Date: 05/29/2003
Last Sold Price: $220,000
We Are Anonymous
We Are Legion
We Do Not Forgive
We Do Not Forget
Expect Us
A man handed this card to an officer at a checkpoint and was released, after having been illegally stopped along with every other driver who happend by. This statement of rights will clarify to police your stance on violations of your constitutionally protected rights to remain free from unwarranted detention.
Laminating this as a card, which can be handed to an officer along with or before handing driver license, will possibly get you set free immediately. Also, in the case of it not setting you free, and the off chance the officer is not wearing gloves, the officer’s fingerprints on the plastic laminate will be evidence that you categorically stated that you do not consent to any stop, questioning, search, or seizure.
– I hereby invoke and refuse to waive all of the following rights afforded to me by the US Constitution:
– I invoke and refuse to waive my 5th amendment right to remain silent. Do not ask me any questions.
– I invoke and refuse to waive my 6th amendment right to an attorney of my choice.
Do not ask me any questions without my attorney present.
– I invoke and refuse to waive all privileges pursuant to the case Miranda vs. Arizona.
Do not ask me any questions or make any comments to me about this decision.
– I invoke and refuse to waive my 4th amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.
I do not consent to any search or seizure of myself, my home or any property in my possession.
Do not ask me about my ownership interests in any property.
– I do not consent to this contact with you. If I’m not presently under arrest or under investigatory detention,
please allow me to leave.
– Any statement or alleged consent I give in response to your questions is hereby made under protest and
under duress – in submission to your claim of lawful authority to force me to provide you with this information.
Oakland Crime Reduction Project
Bratton Group Findings and Recommendations
May 8, 2013
The Bratton Group, LCC, in conjunction with the Strategic Policy Partnership, has
been working with the Oakland Police Police Department (OPD) on improving its
Compstat crime management and command accountability system and on
reorganizing its investigative functions to respond more effectively to homicides,
shootings, robberies, and burglaries. These reforms are an important component in
the larger effort to move the OPD to a Neighborhood Policing Plan, with the city
divided into five districts, each commanded by a captain. The key to this new
district-based structure is geographic accountability for each captain – and for their
subordinate lieutenants, sergeants, and officers – for a specific area of the city with
its specific crime and disorder problems, its familiar community members, and, to a
significant degree, its specific cast of criminal characters. Under the Neighborhood
Policing Plan, the district captains will be the principal crime fighters in the
Department, each taking responsibility for crime in their respective districts and
each held accountable for designing and directing responses and strategies to
counter crime conditions. So far the OPD has established two districts in East
Oakland with three more planned for the western part of the city.
The Neighborhood Policing Plan is a long-term effort to rebuild the service delivery
and crime-fighting capabilities of the OPD after years of attrition that have reduced
OPD headcount by about 25 percent. The OPD is working to add police officers, but
the current staffing shortfalls make it all the more important that the Department
deploys and manages its resources effectively now. The management and structural
reforms recommended here are part of a blueprint for focusing the OPD’s crime
fighting efforts at the local or district level. The Compstat crime management system
is being revamped into a more effective accountability tool, providing a relentless
focus on responding to and resolving local crime and police service problems. In a
key structural reform, the recommended establishment of decentralized District
Investigation Units (DIUs), will give the district captains an investigative resource to
help them in their efforts to counter and control local crime.
The Compstat Process
The Compstat Process is a paradigm-shifting approach to police management. It is an
accountablity tool, a training tool, a motivational tool, and a crime analysis tool. Its
fundamental purpose is to keep key police managers – including chiefs, district
captains, investigative supervisors, and special unit commanders – sharply focused on
the central police responsibilites of responding to and controlling crime. The heart of
the process is a series of regularly scheduled crime strategy meetings where a police
department’s top management and its field managers engage in tough, probing
sessions about current crimes and the plans and tactics to counter them. The Bratton Group Findings and Recommendations 5/8/13
2
recommedations listed below are intended to strengthen OPD’s existing Compstat
process and have been implemented in the past two months.
Findings
• The Compstat Process as previously practiced in Oakland was more of a report
or a presentation by a captain than the system of vigorous strategic oversight.
Compstat should be an intensive and probing dialogue between the
department’s top commanders and its field managers, including patrol,
investigations and special unit commanders.
• The former Compstat presentations were too general and did not deal with
crime specifics. The exchanges at Compstat should be focused on the specifics of
crime patterns and individual crimes and the measures being taken to counter
them.
• As formerly practiced, Oakland’s Compstat did not have a true primary
questioner pressing for answers to the critical questions about specific crime
problems. The department’s primary questioner should study, and be
conversant with, the current crime picture and should be ready to ask a series of
follow-up questions to ensure that every reasonable effort is being made, that
every solid lead is being followed, and that the Department’s various
components are responding swiftly to emerging crime patterns and problems.
• The captains and other field managers at Compstat were not being held
accountable for knowledge of crime in a designated district. Captains,
investigative commanders and special unit commanders should all be expected
to come to the meeting with a thorough familiarity with the crime patterns and
crime conditions in their areas of responsibility, which is achieved by reading
the incident reports about individual crimes.
• Under the existing process there was no sense of coordination, information
sharing or support from the centralized Criminal Invesigation Division (CID).
Recommendations
• Compstat meetings should be firmly under the control of the primary questioner
who drives the process forward and keeps it focused on the specific crime
problems and the plans to counter these problems.
• The primary questioner, not the reporting captain, should control and direct the
electronic maps and screens.
• Captains will be expected to be fully conversant with their crime problems,
having accurate, timely information by reading and understanding all Part I
crime reports.
• Expanded participation and input will be expected from investigative
supervisors at every level in the Department, who should be prepared to
describe in detail the response of their investigative units to current crime
incidents and patterns, to report on the status of all but the most sensitive active
investigations, and to share information about successful strategies.
• The Compstat Report should be a succinct summary of crime and enforcement
activity, showing trends in the previous two- and four-week periods, as well as Bratton Group Findings and Recommendations 5/8/13
3
year-to-date comparisons, that can be used as a departure point for Compstat
discussions.
• Working from the Compstat Report, the primary questioner should engage the
district captain and other relevant supervisors concerning any spikes or trends
in the crime numbers, paying particular attention to spikes in killings and
shootings, and questioning them on their plans to deal with these issues, i.e., the
development of effective tactics.
• All Department chiefs and captains should be present at all Compstat meetings,
except in cases when other important business calls them away. Compstat
should be seen as one most important regular activities taking place in the
Department.
• In addition to general questioning about current crime trends, the primary
questioner should pursue a series of regular lines of questioning at the Compstat
sessions:
o Hot Spots – What is being done to correct conditions at various hot-spot
locations?
o Calls for Service – Are calls for service up or down, and if up, why are they
spiking? Consider highlighting the top five locations for repeat calls in
each district. Why are police continually called there? What is the
underlying problem? Are we wasting valuable resources?
o Enforcement – What is happening with arrests and other enforcement
activity? Why are some officers in a given district very productive while
others are not? Are we making arrests in the right places and for the right
reasons? Are officers being properly directed by their supervisors
towards areas where crime is spiking?
o Warrants – What is the progress on executing Ramey warrants and other
warrants such as bail jumping, failure to appear, and parole warrants?
The number of Ramey warrants should be broken down by district, and
this information provided to each district captain and to the CID captain.
The district captains should be questioned about what is being done to
capture these suspects.
o Measures of Evidence Gathering and Processing – When Bratton Group
recommendations concerning the tracking of crime scene work are
implemented, Compstat should include a recap of crime scene runs and
lab submissions from supervisors assigned to these functions. This would
cover the number of runs responded to, the number of locations
fingerprinted, the number of ballistics and DNA submissions, etc.
o Ceasefire – How many Ceasefire individuals called to a call-in reside in a
district? How many accepted service? How many in/out of jail? How
many have been injured? How many have been victims of crime
themselves? How many are wanted for a crime?
o Persistent Quality-of-Life issues – What are the quality-of-life issues that
are most problematic for the community? What are we doing about them?
Members of the Bratton Group team worked intensively with Assistant Chief
Eric Bershears to help prepare him for his role as the primary Compstat Bratton Group Findings and Recommendations 5/8/13
4
questioner and participated in the Compstat meetings conducted on the new
model. They also assisted in revising the Compstat Report.
District Investigation Units (DIUs)
The recommended establishment of District Investigation Units will decentralize the
investigation of most robberies, burglaries, and shootings. The DIUs will report to the
district captains, giving the captains an investigative resource that can respond swiftly
to crime victims and crime scenes and pursue investigations through to arrest.
Findings
• Centralized investigations conducted by the Criminal Investigation Division
(CID) have not been successful in countering the growing robbery and burglary
problems in Oakland.
• Major Crimes Section 1 of CID, which investigates homicides, gun assaults,
suspicious deaths, and officer-involved shootings, has too large of a workload to
effectively investigate shootings, many of which are closed without further
investigation because of uncooperative victims.
• For a number of reasons, centralized robbery investigators working for Major
Crimes Section 2, are slow to respond to robberies and interview victims, losing
momentum on the investigation of pattern robberies.
• Effectively, burglaries are not investigated in the City of Oakland with only one
part-time investigator assigned to more than 10,000 burglaries last year.
• Increased camera monitoring of commerical areas throughout the city would
provide significantly more leads in robberies and burglaries and in some
shooting cases.
Recommendations
• Reduce the workload of Major Crimes Section 1 to homicides and grievous
assaults from which the victim is likely to die by assigning gun assaults for
investigation at the district level.
• Assign most robberies and non-gun assaults for investigation at the district level.
• Assign burglaries for investigation at the district level.
• Establish District Investigation Units (DIUs) in each of the five districts to
investigate robberies, burglaries, and assaults/shootings.
• Assign experienced investigative sergeants to manage the DIUs. These sergeants
would be responsible for all investigative activity in the districts and would
represent district investigations at Compstat.
• Assign three experienced investigators and three to four police officers to each
DIU, pairing experienced investigators with officers with less experience.
• Assign each investigator/police officer team to one of three specialties: robbery,
burglary, or assaults/shootings.
• Establish staggered schedules for DIU to ensure a working presence by
investigators in the afternoon and evening hours seven days a week. Bratton Group Findings and Recommendations 5/8/13
5
• Have DIU investigators respond to crime scenes, interview victims, canvass for
witnesses, gather evidence and identify crime patterns, modus operandi, and
repeat criminals active in the district.
• As the DIU system is established, use the DIUs as an investigator training ground
and career path, with officers moving in progression from police officer assigned
to a DIU, to a DIU lead investigator, to centralized CID and homicide
investigations.
• Establish strictly observed case management protocols to provide guidelines for
DIU investigations, including updated Investigative Action Reports (IARs) at five
days, 15 days, and 28 days for each active case. The Bratton Group team has
prepared a sample case management system for adaption for use in Oakland.
• Significantly increase the camera monitoring capabilities of the OPD in
commercial areas throughout the city to provide identifications and evidence in
robbery, burglary and some shooting cases. Cameras would be monitored and
recorded at the Domain Awareness Center that is currently under construction.
Evidence Management
For the DIUs to be optimally effective, OPD should implement reforms in the
management of evidence, changing some of the priorities and systems by which
evidence is gathered and analyzed.
Findings
• Crime scene technicians in Oakland work without direct supervision and
therefore with little systematic organization.
• The OPD’s digital photo file access, which could be a key tool in identifying
robbery suspects, is extremely slow and is rarely used in current robbery
investigations.
• Fingerprint evidence gathered at burglary scenes is not generally used in
burglary investigations or submitted for comparisons by the Automated
Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS).
• More extensive and timely analysis of shell casings found at the scenes of
shootings and other crimes could provide stronger evidence in assault cases,
connecting guns to both specific crimes and specific gangs.
Recommendations
• Assign a supervisor, preferably a sergeant, to manage crime scene technicians
and establish a systematic dispatch protocol that both prioritizes and tracks all
crime scene runs.
• Acquire a faster running digital photo system to access Alameda County’s
Consolidated Arrest Report System (CARs) so that photo arrays can be shown
expeditiously to robbery victims.
• Establish a new protocol for the processing of fingerprints from burglary scenes
so that prints in cases with other leads and/or in cases that have been linked a
pattern of burglaries can be submitted for expeditious AFIS comparisons. Hire
additional fingerprint analysts as needed to provide this service. Bratton Group Findings and Recommendations 5/8/13
6
• Increase the analysis of shell casings found at shooting scenes to link specific
weapons to specific crimes across geographical areas and periods of time. Hire
additional ballistic analysts as necessary to provide this service.
This report was obtained and published by Da Lin of KPIX
From the man who said “Quite frankly, I’m always in favor of more cops”
From that same article : ‘Bratton again defended stop-and-frisk, which he said all police departments do to varying degrees. He said the term should be called “stop, question and frisk,” because most police stops end with a question and never result in suspects being searched.
In this interview at 2:27, Bill Bratton reveals a past clarity he has since abandoned.
There was a belief that crime was caused by things that were beyond the influence of the police, such as poverty, demographics … lotta young people … uh, the economy, uh, race issues, ethnic issues, ah the weather, ah … and we believed them.
He seems to have had, at one time, a real grasp on the actual root causes of crime. He goes on to dismiss those as causes.
Two months ago Bratton again appeared in a video interview, grabbing the spotlight to opine about gun control, and to praise and defend the stop & frisk policy, which he does after the question is posed at 4:01. First, they joke about him calling it ‘stop, question, & frisk’ … as if questioning someone for walking while black is better than frisking them for the same ‘suspicious’ behavior. He contradicts himself all in one sentence, then bumbles on.
It is a constitutionally protected activity by police. The challenge for police is to do it legally, compassionately, consistently. Not just in poor neighborhoods, not just in minority neighborhoods. And that is the issue, unfortunately, around the country because that is where it’s most frequently because unfortunately that is where the majority of crime, both serious and minor, it is committed. That’s the reality of our lives, our society. It is an essential tool of policing. Can police be better trained, supervised and monitored, I think they can. Uhh, but those that are advocating that it be done away with or representing that it can be done away with it, I’m sorry but you do away with it and, uh, you’re going to have cities overrun with crime because it is the basic tool that every police department in Amerikkka uses.
One has to wonder, if he was hired as ‘consultant’ by the city of Oakland for $250,000 for a four month stint, why he was being interviewed via videophone from New York, in the middle of his four month assignment.
Bratton goes on to say he won’t respond to something because he hasn’t yet been to Oakland. This interview was published on 22 February 2013. If he hadn’t been to Oakland by that date, how has he managed to deliver this report in less than seven weeks?
He finishes his comments by saying, “This stuff is not rocket science.”
If that is the case, why is Oakland paying $250,000 for some weeks of his time, just after many layoffs and whilst still in the midst of budget woes?
Meanwhile :::
Frazier to Reexamine Police Misconduct
“In an unprecedented move, OPD’s new compliance director plans to reinvestigate closed misconduct cases, including ones involving Occupy Oakland.”
Howard Jordan’s response to these recent developments is to quit his job and try to call it medical retirement.
Today, Freedom of the Press Foundation is publishing the full, previously unreleased audio recording of Private First Class Bradley Manning’s speech to the military court in Ft. Meade about his motivations for leaking over 700,000 government documents to WikiLeaks. In addition, we have published highlights from Manning’s statement to the court.
While unofficial transcripts of this statement are available, this marks the first time the American public has heard the actual voice of Manning.
He explains to the military court in his own cadence and words how and why he gave the Apache helicopter video, Afghanistan and Iraq Wars Logs, and the State Department Diplomatic Cables to WikiLeaks. Manning explains his motives, noting how he believed the documents showed deep wrongdoing by the government and how he hoped that the release would “spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy in general as it related to Iraq and Afghanistan.” In conjunction with the statement, Private First Class Manning also pleaded guilty to 10 of the 22 charges against him.
Freedom of the Press Foundation is dedicated to supporting journalism that combats overreaching government secrecy. We have been disturbed that Manning’s pre-trial hearings have been hampered by the kind of extreme government secrecy that his releases to WikiLeaks were intended to protest. While reporters are allowed in the courtroom, no audio or visual recordings are permitted by the judge, no transcripts of the proceedings or any motions by the prosecution have been released, and lengthy court orders read on the stand by the judge have not been published for public review.
A short film by Laura Poitras
A group of journalists, represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), has been engaged in a legal battle to force the court to be more open. While the government has belatedly released a small portion of documents related to the case, many of the most important orders have been withheld—such as the orders relating to the speedy trial proceedings or the order related to Manning’s prolonged solitary confinement.
Michael Ratner, president emeritus of CCR, called the government “utterly unresponsive to what is a core First Amendment principle.” Ratner noted this is a public trial, the information being presented is not classified, and that contemporaneous access to information about the trial is necessary to understanding the proceedings. Nonetheless, the lawsuit has been tied up in the appeals court for months.
Freedom of the Press Foundation’s mission is to support and defend cutting-edge transparency journalism by supporting those organizations that publish leaks in the public interest. We often report on news surrounding government secrecy, educating the public about the important relationship between leaking and independent journalism. When we received this recording, we realized we had a unique opportunity to bring some small measure of transparency directly by allowing the world to hear for itself the voice of someone who took a controversial and important stance for government transparency.
We hope this recording will shed light on one of the most secret court trials in recent history, in which the government is putting on trial a concerned government employee whose only stated goal was to bring attention to what he viewed as serious governmental misconduct and criminal activity. We hope to prompt additional analysis of these proceedings by other journalistic institutions and the public at large. While we are not equipped (technically or as a matter of human resources) to receive leaked information nor do we plan on receiving them in the future, we are proud to publish and analyze this particular recording because it is so clearly matches our mission of supporting transparency journalism.
The information provided by Manning has uncovered stories of wrongdoing by the United States, as well as by leaders and politicians around the world. The cables were reportedly one of the catalysts that led to the Arab Spring and sped up the end of the Iraq War. To this day, more than two years after their release, the information provided by Manning is used every day by journalists and historians in major publications are the world to enlighten and inform the public, both in the United States and around the world. In a time when the extent and reach of U.S. government secrecy is unprecedented, and there are credible reports that the government has abused its secrecy and classification systems to cover up numerous illegal and unconstitutional activities, Manning’s actions should be seen as an overdue sliver of sunlight into an overly secret system rather than as a basis for a prosecution seeking decades of imprisonment.
By releasing this audio recording, we wish to make sure that the voice of this generation’s most prolific whistleblower can be heard—literally—by the world.
Regardless of whether one believes that Manning’s acts were right or wrong or a mix of both, he has taken responsibility for them by pleading guilty to ten charges, for which he faces up to twenty years in prison. The government however, is continuing to pursue all of the charges against him, including charges under the Espionage Act and “aiding the enemy” —which could have huge consequences for press freedom and the First Amendment. The ACLU has expressed concern that this “aiding the enemy” charge could criminalize speech for all sorts of active military members, noting that “In its zeal to throw the book at Manning, the government has so overreached that its ‘success’ would turn thousands of loyal soldiers into criminals.”
And Harvard Law professor Yochai Benkler has argued that this prosecution could decimate national security journalism by outlawing whole categories of journalist-source relationships in the future: “[T]he prosecutors seem bent on using this case to push a novel and aggressive interpretation of the law that would arm the government with a much bigger stick to prosecute vaguely-defined national security leaks, a big stick that could threaten not just members of the military, but civilians too.”
Extreme secrecy in our courts, just like in our government’s policies and our politics, is an anathema to democracy. Whether military or civilian, this type of closed-door legal process impairs the public’s right-to-know and journalists’ ability to report on matters of deep public concern. The courtrooms of America should be open to the public, so they can see and hear what is being done in their name.
Please spread his words as far as you can: on your blog, in your videos, on Twitter and on Facebook.
Scroll down to listen to and share excerpts from Manning’s full statement that may be of particular public interest. Transcript courtesy Alexa O’Brien.
During this time a blizzard bombarded the mid-atlantic, and I spent a significant period of time essentially stuck in my aunt’s house in Maryland. I began to think about what I knew and the information I still had in my possession. For me, the SigActs represented the on the ground reality of both the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
I felt that we were risking so much for people that seemed unwilling to cooperate with us, leading to frustration and anger on both sides. I began to become depressed with the situation that we found ourselves increasingly mired in year after year. The SigActs documented this in great detail and provide a context of what we were seeing on the ground.
In attempting to conduct counter-terrorism or CT and counter-insurgency COIN operations we became obsessed with capturing and killing human targets on lists and not being suspicious of and avoiding cooperation with our Host Nation partners, and ignoring the second and third order effects of accomplishing short-term goals and missions. I believe that if the general public, especially the American public, had access to the information contained within the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A tables this could spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy in general as [missed word] as it related to Iraq and Afghanistan.
I also believed the detailed analysis of the data over a long period of time by different sectors of society might cause society to reevaluate the need or even the desire to even to engage in counterterrorism and counterinsurgency operations that ignore the complex dynamics of the people living in the effected environment everyday.
At my aunt’s house I debated what I should do with the SigActs—in particular whether I should hold on to them—or expose them through a press agency. At this point I decided that it made sense to try to expose the SigAct tables to an American newspaper. I first called my local news paper, The Washington Post, and spoke with a woman saying that she was a reporter. I asked her if the Washington Post would be interested in receiving information that would have enormous value to the American public.
Although we spoke for about five minutes concerning the general nature of what I possessed, I do not believe she took me seriously. She informed me that the Washington Post would possibly be interested, but that such decisions were made only after seeing the information I was referring to and after consideration by senior editors.
I then decided to contact [missed word] the most popular newspaper, The New York Times. I called the public editor number on The New York Times website. The phone rang and was answered by a machine. I went through the menu to the section for news tips. I was routed to an answering machine. I left a message stating I had access to information about Iraq and Afghanistan that I believed was very important. However, despite leaving my Skype phone number and personal email address, I never received a reply from The New York Times.
I also briefly considered dropping into the office for the Political Commentary blog, Politico, however the weather conditions during my leave hampered my efforts to travel. After these failed efforts I had ultimately decided to submit the materials to the WLO. I was not sure if the WLO would actually publish these SigAct tables [missed a few words]. I was concerned that they might not be noticed by the American media. However, based upon what I read about the WLO through my research described above, this seemed to be the best medium for publishing this information to the world within my reach.
Excerpt 3: Using Tor to submit documents to Wikileaks
On 3 February 2010, I visited the WLO website on my computer and clicked on the submit documents link. Next I found the submit your information online link and elected to submit the SigActs via the onion router or Tor anonymizing network by special link. Tor is a system intended to provide anonymity online. The software routes internet traffic through a network of servers and other Tor clients in order to conceal the user’s location and identity.
I was familiar with Tor and had it previously installed on a computer to anonymously monitor the social media website of militia groups operating within central Iraq. I followed the prompts and attached the compressed data files of CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A SigActs. I attached a text file I drafted while preparing to provide the documents to the Washington Post. It provided rough guidelines saying: “It’s already been sanitized of any source identifying information. You might need to sit on this information – perhaps 90 to 100 days to figure out how best to release such a large amount of data and to protect its source. This is possibly one of the more significant documents of our time removing the fog of war and revealing the true nature of twenty-first century asymmetric warfare. Have a good day.”
Excerpt 4: Manning’s reaction when he found the Apache helicopter video
During the mid-February 2010 time frame the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division targeting analysts, then Specialist Jihrleah W. Showman discussed a video that Ms. Showman had found on the T-drive.
The video depicted several individuals being engaged by an aerial weapons team. At first I did not consider the video very special, as I have viewed countless other war porn type videos depicting combat. However, the recording of audio comments by the aerial weapons team crew and the second engagement in the video of an unarmed bongo truck troubled me.
As Showman and a few other analysts and officers in the T-SCIF commented on the video and debated whether the crew violated the rules of engagement or ROE in the second engagement, I shied away from this debate, instead conducting some research on the event. I wanted to learn what happened and whether there was any background to the events of the day that the event occurred, 12 July 2007.
Using Google I searched for the event by its date by its general location. I found several new accounts involving two Reuters employees who were killed during the aerial weapon team engagement. Another story explained that Reuters had requested for a copy of the video under the Freedom of Information Act or FOIA. Reuters wanted to view the video in order to understand what had happened and to improve their safety practices in combat zones. A spokesperson for Reuters was quoted saying that the video might help avoid the reoccurrence of the tragedy and believed there was a compelling need for the immediate release of the video.
Despite the submission of the FOIA request, the news account explained that CENTCOM replied to Reuters stating that they could not give a time frame for considering a FOIA request and that the video might no longer exist. Another story I found written a year later said that even though Reuters was still pursuing their request. They still did not receive a formal response or written determination in accordance with FOIA.
The fact neither CENTCOM or Multi National Forces Iraq or MNF-I would not voluntarily release the video troubled me further. It was clear to me that the event happened because the aerial weapons team mistakenly identified Reuters employees as a potential threat and that the people in the bongo truck were merely attempting to assist the wounded. The people in the van were not a threat but merely “good samaritans”. The most alarming aspect of the video to me, however, was the seemly delightful bloodlust they appeared to have.
The dehumanized the individuals they were engaging and seemed to not value human life by referring to them as quote “dead bastards” unquote and congratulating each other on the ability to kill in large numbers. At one point in the video there is an individual on the ground attempting to crawl to safety. The individual is seriously wounded. Instead of calling for medical attention to the location, one of the aerial weapons team crew members verbally asks for the wounded person to pick up a weapon so that he can have a reason to engage. For me, this seems similar to a child torturing ants with a magnifying glass.
While saddened by the aerial weapons team crew’s lack of concern about human life, I was disturbed by the response of the discovery of injured children at the scene. In the video, you can see that the bongo truck driving up to assist the wounded individual. In response the aerial weapons team crew – as soon as the individuals are a threat, they repeatedly request for authorization to fire on the bongo truck and once granted they engage the vehicle at least six times.
Shortly after the second engagement, a mechanized infantry unit arrives at the scene. Within minutes, the aerial weapons team crew learns that children were in the van and despite the injuries the crew exhibits no remorse. Instead, they downplay the significance of their actions, saying quote “Well, it’s their fault for bringing their kids into a battle” unquote.
The aerial weapons team crew members sound like they lack sympathy for the children or the parents. Later in a particularly disturbing manner, the aerial weapons team verbalizes enjoyment at the sight of one of the ground vehicles driving over a body – or one of the bodies. As I continued my research, I found an article discussing the book, The Good Soldiers, written by Washington Post writer David Finkel.
In Mr. Finkel book, he writes about the aerial weapons team attack. As, I read an online excerpt in Google Books, I followed Mr. Finkel’s account of the event belonging to the video. I quickly realize that Mr. Finkel was quoting, I feel in verbatim, the audio communications of the aerial weapons team crew.
It is clear to me that Mr. Finkel obtained access and a copy of the video during his tenue as an embedded journalist. I was aghast at Mr. Finkel’s portrayal of the incident. Reading his account, one would believe the engagement was somehow justified as “payback” for an earlier attack that lead to the death of a soldier. Mr. Finkel ends his account by discussing how a soldier finds an individual still alive from the attack. He writes that the soldier finds him and sees him gesture with his two forefingers together, a common method in the Middle East to communicate that they are friendly. However, instead of assisting him, the soldier makes an obscene gesture extending his middle finger.
The individual apparently dies shortly thereafter. Reading this, I can only think of how this person was simply trying to help others, and then he quickly finds he needs help as well. To make matter worse, in the last moments of his life, he continues to express his friendly gesture – only to find himself receiving this well known gesture of unfriendliness. For me it’s all a big mess, and I am left wondering what these things mean, and how it all fits together. It burdens me emotionally.
I saved a copy of the video on my workstation. I searched for and found the rules of engagement, the rules of engagement annexes, and a flow chart from the 2007 time period – as well as an unclassified Rules of Engagement smart card from 2006. On 15 February 2010 I burned these documents onto a CD-RW, the same time I burned the 10 Reykjavik 13 cable onto a CD-RW. At the time, I placed the video and rules for engagement information onto my personal laptop in my CHU. I planned to keep this information there until I redeployed in Summer 2010. I planned on providing this to the Reuters office in London to assist them in preventing events such as this in the future.
However, after the WLO published 10 Reykjavik 13 I altered my plans. I decided to provide the video and the rules of engagement to them so that Reuters would have this information before I re-deployed from Iraq. On about 21 February 2010, I described above, I used the WLO submission form and uploaded the documents. The WLO released the video on 5 April 2010. After the release, I was concern about the impact of the video and how it would been received by the general public.
I hoped that the public would be as alarmed as me about the conduct of the aerial weapons team crew members. I wanted the American public to know that not everyone in Iraq and Afghanistan are targets that needed to be neutralized, but rather people who were struggling to live in the pressure cooker environment of what we call asymmetric warfare. After the release I was encouraged by the response in the media and general public, who observed the aerial weapons team video. As I hoped, others were just as troubled – if not more troubled that me by what they saw.
Excerpt 5: On reporting that Iraqi detainees did nothing wrong
On 27 February 2010, a report was received from a subordinate battalion. The report described an event in which the Federal Police or FP detained 15 individuals for printing anti-Iraqi literature. On 2 March 2010, I received instructions from an S3 section officer in the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division Tactical Operation Center or TOC to investigate the matter, and figure out who the quote “bad guys” unquote were and how significant this event was for the Federal Police.
Over the course of my research I found that none of the individuals had previous ties to anti-Iraqi actions or suspected terrorist militia groups. A few hours later, I received several [playlist?] from the scene – from this subordinate battalion. They were accidentally sent to an officer on a different team on the S2 section and she forwarded them to me.
These photos included picture of the individuals, pallets of unprinted paper and seized copies of the final printed material or the printed document; and a high resolution photo of the printed material itself. I printed up one [missed word] copy of a high resolution photo – I laminated it for ease of use and transfer. I then walked to the TOC and delivered the laminated copy to our category two interpreter.
She reviewed the information and about a half and hour later delivered a rough written transcript in English to the S2 section. I read the transcript and followed up with her, asking her for her take on the content. She said it was easy for her to transcribe verbatim, since I blew up the photograph and laminated it. She said the general nature of the document was benign. The document, as I had sensed as well, was merely a scholarly critique of the then current Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
It detailed corruption within the cabinet of al-Maliki’s government and the financial impact of his corruption on the Iraqi people. After discovering this discrepancy between the Federal Police’s report and the interpreter’s transcript, I forwarded this discovery to the top OIC and the battle NCOIC. The top OIC and the overhearing battle captain informed me that they didn’t need or want to know this information anymore. They told me to quote “drop it” unquote and to just assist them and the Federal Police in finding out, where more of these print shops creating quote “anti-Iraqi literature” unquote.
I couldn’t believe what I heard and I returned to the T-SCIF and complained to the other analysts and my section NCOIC about what happened. Some were sympathetic, but no one wanted to do anything about it.
I am the type of person who likes to know how things work. And, as an analyst, this means I always want to figure out the truth. Unlike other analysts in my section or other sections within the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, I was not satisfied with just scratching the surface and producing canned or cookie cutter assessments. I wanted to know why something was the way it was, and what we could to correct or mitigate a situation.
I knew that if I continued to assist the Baghdad Federal Police in identifying the political opponents of Prime Minister al-Maliki, those people would be arrested and in the custody of the Special Unit of the Baghdad Federal Police and very likely tortured and not seen again for a very long time – if ever.
Instead of assisting the Special Unit of the Baghdad Federal Police, I decided to take the information and expose it to the WLO, in the hope that before the upcoming 7 March 2010 election, they could generate some immediate press on the issue and prevent this unit of the Federal Police from continuing to crack down in political opponents of al-Maliki.
I read more of the diplomatic cables published on the Department of State Net Centric Diplomacy. With my insatiable curiosity and interest in geopolitics I became fascinated with them. I read not only the cables on Iraq, but also about countries and events that I found interesting
The more I read, the more I was fascinated with the way that we dealt with other nations and organizations. I also began to think the documented backdoor deals and seemingly criminal activity that didn’t seem characteristic of the de facto leader of the free world.
Up to this point,during the deployment, I had issues I struggled with and difficulty at work. Of the documents release, the cables were the only one I was not absolutely certain couldn’t harm the United States. I conducted research on the cables published on the Net Centric Diplomacy, as well as how Department of State cables worked in general.
In particular, I wanted to know how each cable was published on SIRPnet via the Net Centric Diplomacy. As part of my open source research, I found a document published by the Department of State on its official website.
The document provided guidance on caption markings for individual cables and handling instructions for their distribution. I quickly learned the caption markings clearly detailed the sensitivity of the Department of State cables. For example, NODIS or No Distribution was used for messages at the highest sensitivity and were only distributed to the authorized recipients.
The SIPDIS or SIPRnet distribution caption was applied only to recording of other information messages that were deemed appropriate for a release for a wide number of individuals. According to the Department of State guidance for a cable to have the SIPDIS [missed word] caption, it could not include other captions that were intended to limit distribution.
The SIPDIS caption was only for information that could only be shared with anyone with access to SIPRnet. I was aware that thousands of military personel, DoD, Department of State, and other civilian agencies had easy access to the tables. The fact that the SIPDIS caption was only for wide distribution made sense to me, given that the vast majority of the Net Centric Diplomacy Cables were not classified.
The more I read the cables, the more I came to the conclusion that this was the type of information that should become public. I once read a and used a quote on open diplomacy written after the First World War and how the world would be a better place if states would avoid making secret pacts and deals with and against each other.
I thought these cables were a prime example of a need for a more open diplomacy. Given all of the Department of State cables that I read, the fact that most of the cables were unclassified, and that all the cables have a SIPDIS caption.
I believe that the public release of these cables would not damage the United States, however, I did believe that the cables might be embarrassing, since they represented very honest opinions and statements behind the backs of other nations and organizations.
You can donate to aggressive journalism outlets dedicated to transparency and accountability on our homepage. You can learn more about Bradley Manning’s case by visiting the Bradley Manning Support Network.
The U.S. Army Military District of Washington released a statement to POLITICO:
“The U.S. Army Military District of Washington has notified the military judge presiding over the United States vs. Pfc. Bradley Manning court martial that there was a violation of the rules for court. The U.S. Army is currently reviewing the procedures set in place to safeguard the security and integrity of the legal proceedings, and ensure Pfc. Manning receives a fair and impartial trial.”
all thanks to freedom of the press foundation for this work
Friday, April 18, 2013
CONTACT: (805) 238-4763
oxcityconf@riseup.net
HISTORIC STATEWIDE CIVIL RIGHTS CONFERENCE TO TAKE PLACE IN OXNARD, CALIFORNIA APRIL 27, 2013
Justice for Our Communities! Families Organizing to Resist Police Brutality and Abuse
Dozens of community organizations and several families that have lost their loved ones to extra-judicial killings by police are set to meet at “Justice for Our Communities! Families Organizing to Resist Police Brutality and Abuse”, a statewide conference that will be held Saturday April 27, 2013 at Oxnard Community College, 4000 South Rose Avenue, from 9am – 5pm. This groundbreaking civil rights conference will consist of several keynote addresses, workshops, and educational/legal panel discussions, as well as a discussion and special session for police brutality victims and their families.
Speakers will include the survivors and relatives of deceased victims of extra-judicial killings such as Robert Ramirez (Oxnard), Oscar Grant (Oakland), Kelly Thomas (Fullerton), Manuel Diaz (Anaheim), Michael Nida (Downey), Jose de la Trinidad (Inglewood), Ernest Dueñez (Manteca), and Andy Avila (Pomona), among many others.
This conference is a component in the ongoing grassroots community resistance that has been spurred on across the state in response to a soaring rise in police militarization, brutality, and officer-committed abuse in working class neighborhoods and communities of color. This conference will create an opportunity for the planning, coordination, and organization of statewide events and actions to address and bring an end to these injustices.
The Honorable Cruz Reynoso, the first Chicano Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court, a Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient, and professor emeritus of law at UC Davis, will deliver a keynote address on the civil responsibilities and rights which citizens and residents enjoy in our state and country, civic engagement to better our communities, and his ongoing involvement in fighting for justice for victims of police violence in the Yolo County/Sacramento area.
Click here to read a letter from the Hon. Cruz Reynoso accepting the invitation to Justice for Our Communities! Families Organizing to Resist Police Brutality and Abuse: http://tinyurl.com/ReynosoOxCityConf
Other keynote speakers include former LAPD Ramparts Division officer Alex M. Salazar, who will address the increase in police killings, the impacts of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) amongst officers, and the racism engrained in the culture of police agencies. Los Angeles-based independent journalist and author Thandisizwe Chimurenga will also speak about the permanent bias in media outlets in their coverage of extra-judicial killings, and the role independent community journalism can play in reshaping the narrative and allowing the pleas of victims’ families to be heard. Minister Keith Mohammad of the Nation of Islam, a key leader in the fight for justice by the family of Oscar Grant (killed in 2009 by BART police in Oakland), will also be speaking at the conference.
The conference is being hosted by Oxnard College MEChA. It is being organized by the Oxnard-based Todo Poder al Pueblo Collective (www.todopoderalpueblo.org) in alliance with sponsoring and endorsing organizations including Chicanos Unidos, Decolonize Oakland, the KEYS Youth Leadership Academy, the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement AFL-CIO (Sacramento), LULAC Downtown Oxnard Council 3128, National Brown Berets, Nida’s Ridaz, Occupy the Hood (Los Angeles), the Oscar Grant Foundation, People’s Community Medics, Stop LAPD Spying, Unión del Barrio, and many more.
Conference attendees are encouraged to pre-register at: tinyurl.com/oxcityconf
PARTICIPATING AND ENDORSING ORGANIZATIONS:
30+300 (Santa Barbara)
50/50 Crew (San Jose)
Chicano Mexicano Prison Project
Chicanos Unidos (Anaheim/Orange County)
Colectivo Todo Poder al Pueblo (Oxnard)
CopWatch (Santa Ana, San Fernando Valley)
Decolonize Oakland
Fresno Autonomous Brown Berets
inLeague Press
Kelly’s Army (Fullerton)
KEYS Youth Leadership (Oxnard)
Labor Council for Latin American Advancement AFL-CIO Sacramento
National Brown Berets Santa Paula
Nida’s Ridaz (Downey/LA)
Occupy the Hood Los Angeles
Oscar Grant Committee (Oakland)
The Oscar Grant Foundation
Oxnard College Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (MEChA)
Peoples Community Medics (Oakland)
P.O.D.E.R. (People Organizing for the Defense and Equal Rights ) Santa Barbara County
Guards at Guantanamo Prison fired ‘less than lethal’ rounds at hunger striking victims of U.S. illegal detention today in an effort to forcibly separate them from the group environment into solitary cages. This action by guards was done in an attempt to force and end to what has been, so far, a month-long hunger strike by prisoners in protest against the treatment and ongoing illegal detention there. The hunger strike has received little to no corporate news coverage since it began.
How did the use of torture become acceptable? Who was behind the implementation of tactics known to not only be illegal in the United States, but in direct violation of all international agreements? In this video, Marc LaMont hill from Huffpost Live interviews five people with direct, personal experience from every angle of the issue.
Brandon Neely served in the army at Guantanamo Bay, and was lied to throughout his service to get him to follow illegal orders. Neely stepped out on a legal limb to tell his story, in direct violation of a nondisclosure agreement required by all Guantanamo personnel. His experience shows how guards in prisons are put into difficult, even abusive conditions. He speaks about receiving threats for speaking out about torture.
The Interrogator author Glenn Carle, a former CIA agent, tells how it felt to find that his ‘subject’ was not a criminal at all, let alone someone who deserved to be extrajudiciously incarcerated without charges or counsel.
Georgetown University Philosophy and Ethics Professor Nancy Sherman, author of five books including The Untold War, reminds us that soldiers doing this type of service are deeply affected by the actions they are ordered to take. Neely agrees with this assessment. When learning the truth about the reasons for incarceration of many of the detainees, the guilt suffered by some is debilitating. Shermann talks about how torture affects not only victims, but perpetrators and their families and communities.
We also hear from medical expert Alan Keller, who is associate professor of Medicine and director of Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture, and Omar Deghayes, a detainee who suffered the loss of one eye during his six years at Guantanamo for what became a revolving door of unsubstantiated accusations. Deghayes dispels any myth that torture is somehow the exception to the rule, clarifying in no uncertain terms that torture at Guantanamo is systemic.
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Army Pvt. Brandon Neely was scared when he took Guantanamo’s first shackled detainees off a bus. Told to expect vicious terrorists, he grabbed a trembling, elderly detainee and ground his face into the cement — the first of a range of humiliations he says he participated in and witnessed as the prison was opening for business.
Neely has now come forward in this final year of the detention center’s existence, saying he wants to publicly air his feelings of guilt and shame about how some soldiers behaved as the military scrambled to handle the first alleged al-Qaida and Taliban members arriving at the
isolated U.S. Navy base.
His account, one of the first by a former guard describing abuses at Guantanamo, describes a chaotic time when soldiers lacked clear rules for dealing with detainees who were denied many basic comforts. He says the circumstances changed quickly once monitors from the International Committee of the Red Cross arrived.
The military says it has gone to great lengths in the seven years since then to ensure the prisoners’ safe treatment. “Our policy is to treat detainees humanely,” said Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, a Pentagon spokesman.
After the Sept. 11 attacks and the swift U.S. military response in Afghanistan, the Bush administration had little time to prepare for the hundreds of prisoners being swept up on the battlefield. The U.S. Southern Command was given only a few weeks notice before they began arriving at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba — a locale thought to be beyond the reach of U.S. and Cuban law. The first arrivals were housed in cages that had been used for Haitian
migrants almost a decade earlier.
Now President Barack Obama is committed to closing the prison and finding new ways of handling the remaining 245 detainees as well as any future terror suspects. Human rights groups say his pledge to adhere to long established laws and treaties governing prisoner treatment is essential if the United States hopes to prevent abuses in the future.
“If Guantanamo has taught us anything, it’s the importance of abiding by the rule of law,” said
Jennifer Daskal, senior counterterrorism counsel for Human Rights Watch.
Or as Neely put it in an interview with The Associated Press this week, “The stuff I did and the stuff I saw was just wrong.”
Neely, a burly Texan who served for a year in Iraq after his six months at Guantanamo, received an honorable discharge last year, with the rank of specialist, and now works as a law enforcement officer in the Houston area. He is also president of the local chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War.
An urge to tell his story led him to the University of California at Davis’ Guantanamo Testimonials Project, an effort to document accounts of prisoner abuse. It includes public statements from three other former guards, but Neely was the first to grant researchers an interview. He also spoke extensively with the AP.
Testimony from the other guards echoes some of Neely’s concerns. One of the other guards, Sean Baker, described in an interview with CBS’ “60 Minutes” how he was beaten and hospitalized by fellow soldiers in a January 2003 training drill in which he wore an orange jumpsuit to play the role of a detainee.
Terry C. Holdbrooks Jr. told the Web site cageprisoners.com in an interview this month that he saw several abuses during his service at Guantanamo in 2003, including detainees subjected to cold temperatures and loud music, and he later converted to Islam.
Neely, 28, describes a litany of cruel treatment by his fellow soldiers, including beatings and humiliations he said were intended only to deliver physical or psychological pain.
A spokeswoman for the detention center, Navy Cmdr. Pauline Storum, said she could not comment on “what one individual may recall” from seven years ago. “Thousands of service members have honorably carried out their duties here in what is an arduous and scrutinized environment,” she said.
Neely’s account sheds new light on the early days of Guantanamo, where guards were hastily deployed in January 2002 and were soon confronted by men stumbling out of planes, shackled and wearing blackout goggles. They were held in chain-link cages and moved to more permanent structures three months later.
The soldiers, many of them still in their teens, had no detailed standard operating procedures and were taught hardly anything about the Geneva Conventions, which provide guidelines for humane treatment of prisoners of war, Neely said, though some learned about them on their own initiative.
“Most of us who had everyday contact with the detainees were really young,” he said in the AP telephone interview.
Army Col. Bill Costello acknowledged that Guantanamo-specific procedures developed over time, but insisted that the guards had strict direction from the start. “This was a professional guard force,” said Costello, who served as a Guantanamo spokesman during its first months and now speaks for the U.S. Southern Command in Miami, which oversees the base.
Only months had passed since the Sept. 11 attacks, and Neely said many of the guards wanted revenge. Especially before the first Red Cross visit, he said guards were seizing on any apparent infractions to “get some” by hurting the detainees. The soldiers’ behavior seemed justified at the time, he said, because they were told “these are the worst terrorists in the world.”
He said one medic punched a handcuffed prisoner in the face for refusing to swallow a liquid nutritional supplement, and another bragged about cruelly stretching a prisoner’s torn muscles during what was supposed to be physical therapy treatments.
He said detainees were forced to submit to take showers and defecate into buckets in full view of female soldiers, against Islamic customs. When a detainee yelled an expletive at a female guard, he said a crew of soldiers beat the man up and held him down so that the woman could
repeatedly strike him in the face.
Neely says he feels personally ashamed for how he treated that elderly detainee the first day. As he recalls it, the man made a movement to resist on his way to his cage, and he responded by shoving the shackled man headfirst to the ground, bruising and scraping his face. Other soldiers hog-tied him and left him in the sun for hours.
Only later did Neely learn — from another detainee — that the man had jerked away thinking he was about to be executed.
“I just felt horrible,” Neely recalled.
Neely grew up in a military family in Huntsville, Texas, and said he initially saw the Army as a career. He says his experiences led him to see the treatment of detainees and the Iraq invasion as “morally wrong.” He refused to return to active duty when called up from the Inactive Ready Reserves in 2007 and ignored repeated letters threatening penalties.
Neely acknowledged that by talking about his experiences, he also has broken the nondisclosure pledge he signed before leaving Guantanamo. He also says a lawyer told him the document he signed could not be enforced.
Storum said guards receive “operational security debriefings” on their way out of Guantanamo “so that personnel are mindful of their responsibilities and are made aware of what can be openly discussed in a public forum.”
Interviews with former guards are rare. The military allows journalists visiting Guantanamo to interview active-duty guards at the base, but they are hand-picked by the military and speak in the presence of public affairs officers.
Neely said discussing his experience now has helped put it behind him. “Speaking out is a good way to deal with this,” he said.
UPDATE- 10:30am Nancy Zorn has been extracted by local law UPDATE- 10:30am Nancy Zorn has been extracted by local enforcement and taken into custody. Please consider contributing to Nancy’s bail fund.
ALLEN, OK – Tuesday, April 9, 2013, 9:00 AM – Oklahoma grandmother Nancy Zorn, 79, from Warr Acres, has locked herself to a piece of heavy machinery effectively halting construction on TransCanada’s Keystone XL toxic tar sands pipeline. This action comes in the wake of the disastrous tar sands pipeline spill in Mayflower Arkansas, where an estimated 80,000 gallons of tar sands spilled into a residential neighborhood and local waterways.
Nancy Zorn, Oklahoma Grandmother
Using a bike-lock Zorn has attached her neck directly to a massive earth-mover, known as an excavator, which has brought construction of Keystone XL to a stop. Zorn is the second Oklahoma grandmother this year risking arrest to stop construction of the pipeline, and her protest is the third in a series of ongoing civil disobedience actions led by the Oklahoma-based coalition of organizations, Great Plains Tar Sands Resistance.
“Right now our neighbors in Arkansas are feeling the toxic affect of tar sands on their community. Will Oklahoma neighborhoods be next?” asked Zorn before taking action today. “I can no longer sit by idly while toxic tar sands are pumped down from Canada and into our communities. It is time to rise up and defend our home. It is my hope that this one small action today will inspire many to protect this land and our water.”
Exxon Mobil’s recent Pegasus pipeline spill has forced local residents to evacuate their homes due to life-threatening toxins released into their neighborhood. Local families have experienced episodes of nausea, headaches, and respiratory problems due to acute exposure to deadly chemicals, like benzene, that are mixed in with the raw tar sands. Pegasus was carrying up to 90,000 barrels of tar sands a day before it ruptured and spilled. The Keystone XL pipeline is slated to carry over 800,000 barrels a day; an alarming 10 times the amount of tar sands.
“In the last two weeks alone there have been at least six different inland oil spills across the country,” said Eric Wheeler, an Oklahoma native and spokesperson for Great Plains Tar Sands Resistance. “It’s time to stop referring to pipeline spills as accidents, it’s now abundantly clear that leaks are just part of business as usual. Tar sands hurt everyone they touch, from the indigenous communities in Alberta whose water is being poisoned, to the Gulf Coast communities that are forced to breathe toxic refinery emissions. We’re not going to allow this toxic stuff in our beautiful state.”
UPDATE- 10:30am Nancy Zorn has been extracted by local law UPDATE- 10:30am Nancy Zorn has been extracted by local enforcement and taken into custody. Please consider contributing to 
