Pubdate: Mon, 31 May 2004
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2004 The New York Times Company
Contact:  http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Bob Herbert, Op-Ed Columnist
Note: Other columns by Bob Herbert http://www.mapinc.org/author/Bob+Herbert
Alert: Prisoner Abuse And The Drug War - What You Can Do 
http://www.mapinc.org/alert/0291.html
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration)

AMERICA'S ABU GHRAIBS

Most Americans were shocked by the sadistic treatment of Iraqi detainees at 
the Abu Ghraib prison. But we shouldn't have been. Not only are inmates at 
prisons in the U.S. frequently subjected to similarly grotesque treatment, 
but Congress passed a law in 1996 to ensure that in most cases they were 
barred from receiving any financial compensation for the abuse.

We routinely treat prisoners in the United States like animals. We 
brutalize and degrade them, both men and women. And we have a lousy record 
when it comes to protecting well-behaved, weak and mentally ill prisoners 
from the predators surrounding them.

Very few Americans have raised their voices in opposition to our shameful 
prison policies. And I'm convinced that's primarily because the inmates are 
viewed as less than human.

Stephen Bright, director of the Southern Center for Human Rights, 
represented several prisoners in Georgia who sought compensation in the 
late-1990's for treatment that was remarkably similar to the abuses at Abu 
Ghraib. An undertaker named Wayne Garner was in charge of the prison system 
at the time, having been appointed in 1995 by the governor, Zell Miller, 
who is now a U.S. senator.

Mr. Garner considered himself a tough guy. In a federal lawsuit brought on 
behalf of the prisoners by the center, he was quoted as saying that while 
there were some inmates who "truly want to do better . . . there's another 
30 to 35 per cent that ain't fit to kill. And I'm going to be there to 
accommodate them."

On Oct. 23, 1996, officers from the Tactical Squad of the Georgia 
Department of Corrections raided the inmates' living quarters at Dooly 
State Prison, a medium-security facility in Unadilla, Ga. This was part of 
a series of brutal shakedowns at prisons around the state that were 
designed to show the prisoners that a new and tougher regime was in charge.

What followed, according to the lawsuit, was simply sick. Officers opened 
cell doors and ordered the inmates, all males, to run outside and strip. 
With female prison staff members looking on, and at times laughing, several 
inmates were subjected to extensive and wholly unnecessary body cavity 
searches. The inmates were ordered to lift their genitals, to squat, to 
bend over and display themselves, etc.

One inmate who was suspected of being gay was told that if he ever said 
anything about the way he was being treated, he would be locked up and 
beaten until he wouldn't "want to be gay anymore." An officer who was 
staring at another naked inmate said, "I bet you can tap dance." The inmate 
was forced to dance, and then had his body cavities searched.

An inmate in a dormitory identified as J-2 was slapped in the face and 
ordered to bend over and show himself to his cellmate. The raiding party 
apparently found that to be hilarious.

According to the lawsuit, Mr. Garner himself, the commissioner of the 
Department of Corrections, was present at the Dooly Prison raid.

None of the prisoners named in the lawsuit were accused of any improper 
behavior during the course of the raid. The suit charged that the inmates' 
constitutional rights had been violated and sought compensation for the 
pain, suffering, humiliation and degradation they had been subjected to.

Fat chance.

The Prison Litigation Reform Act, designed in part to limit "frivolous" 
lawsuits by inmates, was passed by Congress and signed into law by Bill 
Clinton in 1996. It specifically prohibits the awarding of financial 
compensation to prisoners "for mental or emotional injury while in custody 
without a prior showing of physical injury."

Without any evidence that they had been seriously physically harmed, the 
inmates in the Georgia case were out of luck. The courts ruled against them.

This is the policy of the United States of America.

Said Mr. Bright: "Today we are talking about compensating prisoners in Iraq 
for degrading treatment, as of course we should. But we do not allow 
compensation for prisoners in the United States who suffer the same kind of 
degradation and humiliation."

The message with regard to the treatment of prisoners in the U.S. has been 
clear for years: Treat them any way you'd like. They're just animals.

The treatment of the detainees in Iraq was far from an aberration. They, 
too, were treated like animals, which was simply a logical extension of the 
way we treat prisoners here at home.
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake