vigilant TV

A US Justice Department report concludes that conversations were improperly recorded between September 11 detainees and their lawyers, at a detention center in Brooklyn. In some instances detainees were physically abused. Via The Agonist.

Inspector General Glenn A. Fine found that “some officers slammed and bounced detainees against the wall, twisted their arms and hands in painful ways, stepped on their leg restraint chains and punished them by keeping them restrained for long periods of time,” according to a report released today.

The report also found that jail personnel improperly taped meetings between detainees and their lawyers and overused strip searches to punish them.

– Washington Post, Justice Dept. Finds Evidence of Abuse of Sept. 11 Detainees: Inspector General Says VideoTapes Show Physical, Verbal Abuse by Prison Officials.

The DoJ has a brief press release. The report itself does not appear to be available online The report is available here, with thanks to TalkLeft.

Quoting from the section on the recording of attorneys’ visits:

We found that MDC staff members not only videotaped the detainees’ movements when taken from their cells to visit with their attorneys, they also recorded detainees’ visits with their attorneys using video cameras set up on tripods outside the attorney visiting rooms. In total, we found more than 40 examples of staff videotaping detainees’ attorney visits.24 On many videotapes, we were able to hear significant portions of what the detainees were telling their attorneys and sometimes what the attorneys were saying as well.

It appeared that detainees’ attorney visits were recorded intentionally. On one occasion, an officer instructed the detainee not to speak in Arabic with his attorney because the meeting was being videotaped. In another videotape, a lieutenant told the detainee and his attorney that he had been instructed that they were required to speak in English during the visit. We also observed on several occasions that officers lingered outside the attorney visiting rooms and appeared to be listening to the conversations.

– USDoJ, Video and Audio Taping Detainees’ Meetings with Their Attorneys.