ALEXANDRIA, Va. (CN) — The solitary figure stands on a box, arms outstretched.
They are draped in black canvas, their face concealed by a black bag. Wires are connected to their fingers from a drab wall in dull paint.
It’s one of the most symbolic images of the United States’ War on Terror; the photo that has come to epitomize the treatment of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
Nearly 20 years later, the ghosts of one of the darker chapters in U.S. foreign policy were reawakened Monday, as the civil trial against CACI Premier Technology Inc., a government contractor who supplied interrogators for the notorious prison, began in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Alexandria.
The plaintiffs are three Iraqis who were held at the prison — Salah Hasan Nusaif Al-Ejaili, Asa’ad Hamza Hanfoosh Zuba’e and Suhail Najim Abdullah Al Shimari.
The Center for Constitutional Rights brought the federal lawsuit against the Northern Virginia-based company in 2008. Over the past 16 years, it has been through the legal ringer, with the court dismissing one corporate defendant, one former CACI employee and one of the plaintiffs.
But at long last the case is being heard by a jury — composed of five men and three women, some of whom were likely children when the abuses occurred.
Al-Ejaili, who is now 53, was a freelance journalist working for Al-Jazeera when he was picked up by the U.S. military. He reached Abu Ghraib on Nov. 8, 2003.
“My life before was not the same as after that date,” he testified through an interpreter.
Al-Ejaili said he quickly was taken to a cell and told to get naked. He had a bag placed over his head, his hands tied behind his head and left naked and standing with no food or water through a cold November night.
Al-Ejaili said being naked is considered a shame in Arabic culture, but he and other detainees were kept naked “80%” of their time in Abu Ghraib.
“I felt humiliated,” he said. “I wished to die.”
Al-Ejaili was clearly uncomfortable discussing his experience. While telling a story of asking a female military police officer for clothes, he started to cry when recounting that she returned with women’s undergarments.
“The punishments were ongoing for the slightest reasons,” he said. “The injustice I faced was immense.”
Eleven U.S. soldiers were convicted and five others disciplined for abusing prisoners over 2003 and 2004. Primarily led by military police who oversaw detainees, the prisoners were subjected to physical abuse, sexual humiliation and other human rights violations.
CACI is involved because the military was woefully short on interrogators for the thousands of Iraqis rounded up after the U.S. and its allies toppled Saddam Hussein. The plaintiffs do not allege that CACI interrogators abused them, rather that the contractors directed military police to “soften up” prisoners ahead of interrogations.
“Not only did CACI interrogators encourage MPs to abuse detainees, they directed them to do so,” Baher Azmy, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights, told the jury. “They are legally responsible for that behavior.”
The company, however, contends it should not be held liable over the actions of a few interrogators.
“What they’re trying to do is say three people from CACI were named in a government report on misconduct and they want to play on your emotions,” CACI’s attorney John O’Connor told the jury.
O’Connor said the plaintiffs have three hurdles to cross: they must prove they were tortured, prove any torture was connected to CACI employees and, if individual employees conspired to commit torture, prove why the company should be held liable. His opening statement and questioning of two witnesses on Monday laid out his case that the military, not CACI, ran the show at Abu Ghraib.
“The army’s pretty jealous of who has control of operations in a war zone,” he said.
O’Connor said any abuse was at the hands of “sadistic” MPs separate from interrogations.
“They were sick. They were bad people. They were criminals,” he said. “The abuse had no connection to the interrogation mission.”
O’Connor pressed Al-Ejaili on the presence of any CACI employees during his ordeal, but he said he was unable to tell who was a civilian and who was a soldier in most cases.
The plaintiffs next called Torin Nelson, who was hired by CACI to serve as a military interrogator in 2003 and deployed to Abu Ghraib. He had previously served 12 years in the military as an interrogator.
“In my opinion, Abu Ghraib was probably the worst deployment I had,” he said.
When Nelson learned about the background of his fellow CACI employees in Iraq, he said he was worried.
“There didn’t seem to be a lot of U.S. Army, U.S. interrogation school background,” he testified.
Nelson’s testimony focused on his interactions with Daniel "DJ" Johnson and Timothy Dugan, both CACI interrogators named in government reports for abuse.
During his time at the prison, Nelson said he was concerned Dugan and Johnson were being excessively violent in their interactions with detainees. He eventually reported the two to military investigators.
O’Connor tried to push back on Nelson’s testimony, insinuating CACI could do nothing about operations at the prison, but Nelson countered “sure they could.”
Attorneys also played the deposition of one of the convicted soldiers, Specialist Charles Graner, who received a 10-year sentence for his actions. Graner said the abuse was directed by military intelligence, which included civilian contractors like CACI.
“Written or unwritten, we followed what we were instructed to do," he said in the 2013 deposition.
The trial is expected to continue through the end of next week.
Follow @TheNolanStout
Subscribe to Closing Arguments
Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.
