Two CIA torture psychologists, who were paid $80miliion by the government to develop interrogation techniques, made a secret settlement to avoid going to trial.
James Mitchell and John ‘Bruce’ Jessen were contracted by the agency to design the department’s harsh interrogation program used in the war on terror following the September 11 attacks.
The two psychologists were sued by two living ex-detainees and one who died of hypothermia after brutal questioning in US custody, alleging they were illegally tortured using the men’s methods.
Mitchell and Jessen, who were paid around $80million for their work, reportedly developed and administered techniques that included waterboarding, stuffing detainees into coffin-like boxes, starvation and sleep deprivation.
In a deal announced on Thursday, the men have agreed to secretly settle the suit, avoiding the civil jury trial that was scheduled to begin next month.
James Mitchell (left) and John ‘Bruce’ Jessen (right) were paid $80million by the CIA to develop the program’s interrogation techniques after 9/11. They secretly settled a suit on Thursday, in which ex-detainees claimed they were illegally tortured using the men’s methods
The psychologists reportedly developed and administered techniques that included waterboarding, stuffing detainees into coffin-like boxes, starvation and sleep deprivation. Pictured: Graphic on controversial CIA interrogation techniques outlined in a memo released by the US Justice Department in 2009
The landmark lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union in 2015 marked the first time the CIA or its private contractors have been held accountable for the torture program, said professor Deborah Pearlstein of the Cardozo Law School in New York.
The deal avoided what would have been the first public trial of the CIA’s use of torture on suspected Al-Qaeda members.
But it also allowed Jessen and Mitchell, who were recruited by the CIA in 2002, to maintain that they personally had nothing to do with the use of waterboarding, extreme stress positions and beatings on detainees.
Jessen said a statement: ‘Neither Dr. Mitchell nor I knew about, condoned, participated in, or sanctioned the unauthorized actions that formed the basis for this lawsuit.
‘We served our country at a time when freedom and safety hung in the balance.’
The two were paid around $80million for their work, which included helping interrogate Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the September 11, 2001 attacks by Al-Qaeda, and Abu Zubaydah, another top Qaeda suspect.
Suleiman Abdullah Salim (left) and Mohamed Ben Soud (right) were two of the plaintiffs in the suit. They claim they were subjected to waterboarding, daily beatings and sleep deprivation in secret CIA sites. They were later released after officials determined they posed no threat
The suit accused Mitchell and Jessen of responsibility for the CIA’s use of torture methods on the three detainees, Tanzanian Suleiman Abdullah Salim, Libyan Mohamed Ahmed Ben Soud, and Gul Rahman of Afghanistan.
Rahman, an Afghan, was taken from his home in Pakistan in 2002 to a secret CIA prison in Afghanistan.
He died of hypothermia weeks later after being shackled to a floor in near-freezing conditions, and the ACLU described his time as two weeks of brutal torture.
The ACLU had sought to pin responsibility in part on the psychologists, as well as gain a significant financial award for the men and Rahman’s family.
The lawsuit claimed the psychologists designed, implemented and personally administered an experimental torture program.
The techniques they developed included waterboarding, slamming the three men into walls, stuffing them inside coffin-like boxes, exposing them to extreme temperatures, starving them and keeping them awake for days, the ACLU said.
According to the lawsuit, Salim and Ben Soud both were subjected to waterboarding, daily beatings and sleep deprivation in secret CIA sites.
Salim and Ben Soud were later released after officials determined they posed no threat.
The suit against the men was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union in 2015. The deal avoided what would have been the first public trial of the CIA’s use of torture on suspected Al-Qaeda members
A U.S. Senate investigation in 2014 found that Mitchell and Jessen’s techniques produced no useful intelligence. President Barack Obama terminated the contract in 2009.
Mitchell and Jessen previously worked at the Air Force survival school at Fairchild Air Force Base outside Spokane, where they trained pilots to avoid capture and resist interrogation and torture.
The CIA hired them to reverse-engineer their methods to break terrorism suspects.
The ACLU and lawyers for the defendants declined to give any details of the settlement, including whether any money would be paid as part of it.
In the settlement statement, the plaintiffs stood by their allegations that Mitchell and Jansen had responsibility for the extreme interrogation methods used on them.
However, they said afterward, ‘We brought this case seeking accountability and to help ensure that no one else has to endure torture and abuse, and we feel that we have achieved our goals.’
‘We were able to tell the world about horrific torture, the CIA had to release secret records, and the psychologists and high-level CIA officials were forced to answer our lawyers’ questions,’ they said.
James Smith, the main lawyer for Mitchell and Jensen, said the treatment of the three, while regrettable, was not the fault of his clients.
‘If this case had gone forward, the facts would have borne out that while the plaintiffs suffered mistreatment by some of their captors, none of that mistreatment was conducted, condoned or caused by Drs. Mitchell and Jessen,’ Smith said.