The FBI and Torture

Steve Bergstein tells the horrific story of the ordeal suffered by Abdallah Higazy, who was coerced into a false “confession” after 9-11 by an FBI agent who threatened that he would have Egyptian security forces torture his family.

The long and the short of it was that an Egpytian national, Abdallah Higazy, was staying in a hotel in New York City on September 11 and the hotel emptied out when the planes hit the towers. The hotel later found in the closet of his room a device that allows you to communicate with airline pilots. Investigators thought this guy had something to do with 9/11 so they questioned him. According to Higazi, the investigators coerced him into confessing to a role in 9/11. Higazi first adamantly denied any involvement with 9/11 and could not believe what was happening to him. Then, he says, the investigator said his family would go through hell in Egypt, where they torture people like Saddam Hussein. Higazy then realized he had a choice: he could continue denying the radio was his and his family suffers ungodly torture in Egypt or he confesses and his family is spared. Of course, by confessing, Higazy’s life is worth garbage at that point, but … well, that’s why coerced confessions are outlawed in the United States.

So Higazy “confesses” and he’s processed by the criminal justice system. His future is quite bleak. Meanwhile, an airline pilot later shows up at the hotel and asks for his radio back. This is like something out of the movies. The radio belonged to the pilot, not Higazy, and Higazy was free to go, the victim of horrible timing. Higazi was innocent! He next sued the hotel and the FBI agent for coercing his confession. The bottom line in the Court of Appeals: Higazy has a case and may recover damages for this injustice.

As I read the opinion I realized it was a 44 page epic, too long for me to print out. I blogged about the opinion while I read it online and then posted the blog as I ate lunch. Then something strange happened: a few minutes after I posted the blog, the opinion vanished from the Court of Appeals website! I had never seen this before, and what made all the more strange was that it involved a coerced confession over 9/11. What the hell was going on?

I let some other legal bloggers know about this, particulary the How Appealing blog and Appellate Law and Practice. They both ran a commentary on the missing opinion. Then someone sent How Appealing a PDF of the decision (probably very few of them were floating around since the opinion was posted for a brief period of time) and How Appealing posted the decison.

Then things got even stranger. The Court of Appeals actually phoned How Appealing to request that he remove the opinion from his website since it contained classified information. The Court said that a revised opinion would come out the next day without the classified information. How Appealing actually refused to remove the opinion. Through it all, hundreds of people came to my legal blog to see my summary of the opinion. It was either my blog or printing out and reading a 44 page epic.

The next day, the Court of Appeals reissued the Higazy opinion. With a redaction. The court simply omitted from the revised decision facts about how the FBI agent extracted the false confession from Higazy. For some reason, this information is classified. Just as the opinion gets interesting, when we are about to learn how an FBI agent named Templeton squeezed the “truth” out of Higazy, the opinion reads at page 7: “This opinion has been redacted because portions of the record are under seal. For the purposes of the summary judgment motion, Templeton did not contest that Higazy’s statements were coerced.”

So the opinion, while interesting, is much less interesting because now we don’t know how the FBI extracts false confessions from people. Looking at things from another angle, we don’t know how the FBI gets suspected terrorists to tell the truth. Except that we do know this, because the opinion is still available from the How Appealing website. The horse is out of the barn, and the classified portion of the opinion is embedded in the Internet for all eternity. Not only is this decision not to remove the premature opinion now a subject of debate (people tend to think that How Appealing did the right thing in keeping the opinion available), but now we can see the part of the ruling that the Court redacted:

Higazy alleges that during the polygraph, Templeton told him that he should cooperate, and explained that if Higazy did not cooperate, the FBI would make his brother “live in scrutiny” and would “make sure that Egyptian security gives [his] family hell.” Templeton later admitted that he knew how the Egyptian security forces operated: “that they had a security service, that their laws are different than ours, that they are probably allowed to do things in that country where they don’t advise people of their rights, they don’t – yeah, probably about torture, sure.”Higazy later said, “I knew that I couldn’t prove my innocence, and I knew that my family was in danger.” He explained that “[t]he only thing that went through my head was oh, my God, I am screwed and my family’s in danger. If I say this device is mine, I’m screwed and my family is going to be safe. If I say this device is not mine, I’m screwed and my family’s in danger. And Agent Templeton made it quite clear that cooperate had to mean saying something else other than this device is not mine.”

Higazy explained why he feared for his family:

The Egyptian government has very little tolerance for anybody who is —they’re suspicious of being a terrorist. To give you an idea, Saddam’s security force—as they later on were called his henchmen—a lot of them learned their methods and techniques in Egypt; torture, rape, some stuff would be even too sick to . . . . My father is 67. My mother is 61. I have a brother who developed arthritis at 19. He still has it today. When the word ‘torture’ comes at least for my brother, I mean, all they have to do is really just press on one of these knuckles. I couldn’t imagine them doing anything to my sister.

And Higazy added:

[L]et’s just say a lot of people in Egypt would stay away from a family that they know or they believe or even rumored to have anything to do with terrorists and by the same token, some people who actually could be —might try to get to them and somebody might actually make a connection. I wasn’t going to risk that. I wasn’t going to risk that, so I thought to myself what could I say that he would believe. What could I say that’s convincing? And I said okay.

That’s how they do it, folks. If a foreign national is suspected of terrorist activity, the FBI will threaten to have a brutal foreign government punish his family. And punishment in a place like Egypt is not like punishment here. Punishment here consists of solitary confinement and a very long prison term. Punishment over there is torture.

Hat Tip: This Modern World, via Mark Shea.

See also New York Times.

“Itching Ears”

2 Timothy 3:1-5–”This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.”

2 Timothy 4:3-4–”For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”

2 Peter 3:16-17–[Speaking of Paul's epistles] “in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction. Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own stedfastness.”

All these Biblical verses and more can apply to a new movie, “For the Bible Tells Me So,” directed by Daniel Karslake–the point of the film is to twist Scripture to provide divine blessing for homosexuality. CitizenLink.

The pattern is familiar–take every reference to homosexual acts in Old Testament and New and say, “It doesn’t really mean that.” Or, “The radical imperative of the Gospel goes beyond that.”

A Christian hermeneutic must start with God’s intention for man in creation–one man, one woman, given to each other, given the command to cleave to one another, and to be fruitful and multiply. Marriage is an institution in creation, grounded in the very being of man and woman, in their physical complementarity and longing for communion. All Biblical law, Old Testament and New, is rooted in this affirmation.

We are in the last days. When Christians can twist Scripture in such a way as to deny its most basic teachings about humanity, it is clear that the cup of iniquity has been filled to overflowing. When Christianity is demonized, and made to be a scapegoat because of the guilt that sinners feel, when they rush to silence its voice rather than repent of their sin, we must recognize that time is reaching its end. To those who feel oppressed by sin, to those who feel convicted by the law, we as Christians must say all the more fervently: There is hope. It comes not from denying your sin. It comes not from turning the law around to say something else. It comes not from urging a form of love which accepts any action. Rather, hope comes in the promise that there is forgiveness for everyone who repents. Turn from your sin, hear the good news–Jesus Christ will forgive you, and make you whole.

Michigan in the Morning

I’m heading off to Berrien Springs, MI, tomorrow for a conference on the 50th anniversary of the publication of the book, Seventh-day Adventists Answer Questions on Doctrine. The questions were asked by Walter Martin and Donald Barnhouse. The answers were given by some folks in the Ministerial department of the General Conference. Not everyone was happy with the answers.

I’ll be able to meet some fellow bloggers and some old friends and get caught up on some theological conversations.

Is the President under the Law?

Yale Law School professor Jed Rubenfeld comments on the confirmation testimony of Michael Mukasey.

According to Judge Mukasey’s statement, as well as other parts of his testimony, the president’s authority “to defend the nation” trumps his obligation to obey the law. Take the federal statute governing military commissions in Guantánamo Bay. No one, including the president’s lawyers, argues that this statute is unconstitutional. The only question is whether the president is required to obey it even if in his judgment the statute is not the best way “to defend the nation.”

If he is not, we no longer live under the government the founders established.

Under the American Constitution, federal statutes, not executive decisions in the name of national security, are “the supreme law of the land.” It’s that simple. So long as a statute is constitutional, it is binding on everyone, including the president.

The president has no supreme, exclusive or trumping authority to “defend the nation.” In fact, the Constitution uses the words “provide for the common defense” in its list of the powers of Congress, not those of the president. …
If Judge Mukasey cannot say plainly that the president must obey a valid statute, he ought not to be the nation’s next attorney general.

“Deliverance” and Iraq

Unsettling commentary in Newsweek by Christopher Dickey comparing the movie, “Deliverance” (written by his father), to US involvement in Iraq. It’s Dick Cheney as Lewis Medlock. My hard copy just came in the mail, and I read it over lunch.

In the end, though, it is not the übermensch [Lewis, played by Burt Reynolds] who offers deliverance from the nasty, brutish horrors of the river and the men of the forest. It is the perfectly ordinary man, the just-getting-by guy, Ed Gentry (Jon Voight), who transcends himself to survive. He is not inspired by a vision of the future, he does not aspire to be tested by man and nature. He’s motivated by fear, pure and simple, and his desire to return to his normal life without that fear.

In the early parts of the story, Ed thinks Lewis is a little nuts, but he’s fascinated by the idea that Lewis might be right about—something—he’s not sure what. Obsessions like those of Lewis Medlock can create their own charisma, inspiring fear while pretending to resist it. Untested ersatz fortitude often looks impressive. The other businessmen from Atlanta, the soft-spoken Drew (Ronny Cox) and porcine Bobby (Ned Beatty), think Lewis is a lot nuts. In fact, they think he’s dangerous. And they’re right.

Me, I think Lewis is Vice President Dick Cheney’s closet fantasy of himself, and as such, a sort of model for the Bush administration as a whole. And Ed, he’s about the rest of us, just scared and trying to get by. And the river? That’s the war in Iraq.

Traditional Anglicans Seek Union with Rome

The bishops of the Traditional Anglican Communion (claiming 500,000 members) are seeking reunion with Rome.

The Legionaries of Christ

The Legionaries of Christ are suing a noted critic, former Legionary priest John Paul Lennon (REGAIN), demanding that he return certain secret documents, including the order’s constitution, norms for etiquette, etc. Why these things should be secret in the first place is a mystery.

Reportedly, the Vatican has directed the order to get rid of a couple of secrets–its private vows:

1. Never to desire, seek or scheme to obtain responsibilities or positions in the congregation for himself or others. …

2. Never to criticize externally the acts of government or the person of any director or superior of the congregation by word, in writing or any other way. And if he knows for certain that a religious has broken this commitment, to inform the latter’s immediate superior.

Links: Life-After-RC, National Catholic Reporter article, Washington Post.

Rudy Giuliani and Msgr. Alan Placa

ABC reports: Guiliani Defends, Employs Priest Accused of Molesting Teens. It’s not a new story: AP October 4, CNA June 28, Salon June 22, Blog Feb 25. Giuliani continues to claim his high school pal has been “unjustly accused.”

Msgr. Alan Placa was not only accused of molestation as a priest, but was also a lawyer, and vice-chancellor of the Diocese of Rockville Center (one of the most notoriously liberal dioceses in the 80s and 90s), and responsible for investigating accusations of sexual abuse against other priests (and assisting other dioceses). Placa has been on leave for five years, but continues to live in a rectory, and is still listed as a “priest in residence.”

Placa has been accused of high handed and deceptive tactics in his role as investigator:

Several families, for instance, have accused him of trying to extract information from victims in his capacity as a spiritual adviser, then using that information to help the diocesan legal strategy.

“He wore the collar when it was appropriate, and he took it off when it wasn’t,” said Cary Scott Goldinger, a lawyer in Garden City who has represented several clients who accuse priests of abuse. Monsignor Placa has denied doing that.

In recent months, some families have also focused on Monsignor Placa’s connection to the House of Affirmation in Whitinsville, Mass., a now-defunct treatment center for troubled priests that became the target of at least two lawsuits charging sexual abuse, and numerous other lawsuits charging financial improprieties in the 1980’s.

In one of the abuse cases, Mark Barry of Uxbridge, Mass., said he had been molested repeatedly as a child in the 1970’s by several priests engaged in a child sex ring, chiefly the Rev. Thomas A. Kane, the executive director of the House of Affirmation. Court papers in the lawsuit against Father Kane; the bishop of Worcester, Mass.; and the House of Affirmation show that the first person Father Kane contacted when learning about Mr. Barry’s accusations was not a local lawyer, but Monsignor Placa.

In an interview, Monsignor Placa said he did serve as a legal consultant on the case, which was filed in 1993. He said one of the people who was on the House of Affirmation’s board of directors was another Long Island priest and longtime friend, Msgr. Brendan Riordan.

Riordan is pastor of the parish where Placa now lives–they have owned several properties together.

Update: Rod Dreher comments.

The Atlanta Drought

Rod Dreher on the drought in Atlanta. He links to a New York Times article on how Atlanta has fiddled while the water supply has dropped.

The response to the worst drought on record in the Southeast has unfolded in ultra-slow motion. All summer, more than a year after the drought began, fountains sprayed and football fields were watered, prisoners got two showers a day and Coca-Cola’s bottling plants chugged along at full strength. On an 81-degree day this month, an outdoor theme park [Stone Mountain] began to manufacture what was intended to be a 1.2-million-gallon mountain of snow.

By September, with the lake forecast to dip into the dregs of its storage capacity in less than four months, the state imposed a ban on outdoor water use.

Golf courses continue to be watered, as they are designated as “agricultural.”

Further north, Duke University and University of North Carolina continue to water their Astroturf. Responded a coach, “We made a commitment that we would not water at our homes.”

Planned Parenthood’s Abortion Statistics

Marcel Lejeune has a statistician friend take a look at a recent Planned Parenthood report on abortion worldwide, and finds some problems in their methodology.

Moral Equivalency?

Many Catholic apologists are pointing to the recent story about sexual abuse in public schools and crowing–”See, you can’t fault celibacy or anything else unique about the priesthood! Schools have the same problem!”

But do they? Is it the same problem?

AP reports 2,570 cases of teachers being removed for sex-related problems (out of 3,000,000 teachers). 1,801 of those cases involved “young people” (not defined)–80% of those were students–or 1,400 cases.

So, that’s 1,400 of the 3,000,000 teachers who’ve been working the past five years. Catholic numbers are 4,400 of 110,000 priests who’ve been in service over the past 50 years.

The report doesn’t break down the cases by sex. Some involve female teachers with 16 (or 17 or 18) year old male students, but the report says (not surprisingly) that most of the teachers are male.

Among these are cases like Stephen Murmer, fired for painting with his butt (despite the fact he did all he could to keep his painting career separate from his school teaching).

Can these instances really be compared with what has happened in the Catholic Church? No. The Catholic problem isn’t just about priests who want to have sex with young people under 18. It’s about homosexual priests who prey overwhelmingly among young men, mainly teenagers. It’s about a culture of homosexuality that has pervaded many seminaries and dioceses and religious orders … that sought to change Catholic teaching on morals … about homosexual priests and bishops who covered up for one another … about bishops who moved offenders again, and again, and again, and again. And it was all being done by people who supposedly had an “indelible character,” recipients of a sacrament that supposedly gave them an extra helping of the Holy Spirit, who were believed to speak with divine authority. And how many of those bishops have been removed …?

Is that what’s happening here? It doesn’t sound like it. Still evil–but it isn’t the Catholic problem.

So you don’t forget all that’s involved in the unique Catholic scandal, see Roman Catholic Faithful, BishopAccountability.org, and Goodbye, Good Men.