"They were taking pictures of what they did at work all day," [Guy Womack, Specialist Graner’s civilian lawyer,] said of Specialist Graner and his friends. "The crime is that somebody leaked the photographs. It got out to the public and it embarrassed the United States government. And that’s a shame. I wish it hadn’t happened.
NYT: Jury Takes Five Hours to Reach Verdict in Abu Ghraib Case
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January 15, 2005
The Crime
Comments
they will jail specialist graner certainly but it will not be anything like the 17 & half years – that are implied in the charges
graner is a prison guard who will now taste what he has done not only in iraq but in america where he worked in the american prison industry
unfortunately we have not heard whether any of the people ‘really’ responsible for this business will ever face a tribunal or even suffer professionally for what are self evidently – actions of great evil carried out by small men & mlle england
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 15 2005 1:18 utc | 2
I’ve personally witnessed a jury sentence a guy to 32 years in prison for “conspiracy to distribute cocaine”, so i’m glad that this jury took 5 hrs. in recommending sentence.
In the case I’m referencing–a case much more interesting factually and evidentiary-wise, at the end of the day, the jury took 30 minutes to sentence.
Supper-time, you know: didn’t want to miss their steak and potatties.
After that one, I was off my feed for a good long while.
Posted by: FlashHarry | Jan 15 2005 1:49 utc | 3
Discipline and Punish
I am stunned, actually. I read through the links on the punishment of children, and I never knew that people were using hot sauce to punish little kids (a practice from the fundie south), or that “christians” were selling spanking rods, or that some idiot in Chicago had developed a stun gun to punish children.
I want to scream right now.
If people think this sort of thing is necessary for their children, or acceptable, or “good for them,” no wonder so many in this “christian nation” have no problem with torturing strangers.
Posted by: fauxreal | Jan 15 2005 6:17 utc | 4
Graner’s demeanor at the beginning of the trial was upbeat, telling reporters at one point, “Whatever happens is going to happen, but I still feel it’s going to be on the positive side, and I’m going to have a smile on my face.’ As the trial wore on, his expressions grew more stoic.
Welcome to Prison Graner.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jan 15 2005 8:38 utc | 5
This is a hard one to call.
Graner certainly deserves to be punished. He is truly sadistic and guilty of all the charges brought against him. According to stories I read here and there, he was indeed following orders so should not be the one receiving the bulk of responsibility.
There are many more guilty here going all the way up to the Oval Office who will evidently, once again, not be held responsible.
I fear now that a sacrifice has been offered up to the world, the story will get “closure”.
Posted by: dan of steele | Jan 15 2005 9:44 utc | 6
Juan Cole
“Graner is small potatoes, and it seems clear that the torture policies came from much higher up, but this is probably as far as the investigation will go. If Congress had been in the hands of the Democrats, you might have had serious hearings on all this (not that everyone in Congress wasn’t appalled). But we in the US now live in what is virtually a one-party state, and such states don’t investigate themselves.
The most disturbing aspect of the Graner trial was his defense attorney’s attempt to compare the torture techniques used on the prisoners with the pyramids that US cheerleaders form for their routines. It was a callous thing to say, and the Arab world knew it.”
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jan 15 2005 11:21 utc | 7
I never knew that people were using hot sauce to punish little kids (a practice from the fundie south), or that “christians” were selling spanking rods, or that some idiot in Chicago had developed a stun gun to punish children.
And of course, these are the same people who are “pro-life” and insist that you bring unplanned pregnancies to fruition. Because obviously we need more children to use these lovely discipline measures on.
Posted by: SusanG | Jan 15 2005 14:19 utc | 8
Fauxreal: it’s called “family values”, you know. What liberals lack.
Posted by: Clueless Joe | Jan 15 2005 17:06 utc | 9
How many instances of torture took place? How many have been documented? What exactly is its geographical spread?
(one certainly partial summary with refs.) NYT
Even if one only tallies the deaths (admitted by the US, or solidly attested to), and only charges the low-level executors (executant in French..) who murdered, we should be seeing more than 20 Graners in court right now.
Graner fits the popular stereotype of the sadistic perp – sends pictures of atrocities to friends and is unrestrained, has a loud mouth. The Graner – Lyndie couple are tabloid material, represent the mythological figures of the evil pair, sexually deviant, deranged, dissolute, brutish, poor, giving birth in desperate cirumstances. ‘Poor’ is perhaps unfortunate for PR purposes – but maybe not – evil dressed up as inherent in the ordinary is very acceptable and probably goes over well with caviar left (EU terms) or arrogant Blues who can thereby distance themselves. Anyway, no better figure was available.
People like Graner exist, everybody knows it.
The more sickening he is made out to be, the better.
Graner did not kill anyone – crucial point.
There is something wrong with my post. Like other articles and comments, it seems to assume that all this is well in the past and what is being dealt with now is the aftermath.
Clumsy closure … done with.. move on, nothing to see here. Bad apples have a bright future, expect more.
Posted by: Blackie | Jan 15 2005 17:43 utc | 10
OT: billmon’s got another new post this afternoon.
Posted by: semper fubar | Jan 15 2005 19:37 utc | 11
Blackie, the Center for Cooperative Research has a very thorough timeline about torture.
Incidentally, they also put together a stunning timeline on events related to 9/11. It’s massive (1600 events) but well worth a read.
Posted by: pedro | Jan 15 2005 20:52 utc | 12
And speaking of crime…
Part I and Part II of Huck Gutman’s excellent analysis of the impact of the expiry of the MFA.
Those with a little historical perspective on capitalism and global markets will remember the mass deaths in India as the British Raj destroyed the local textile industry that had provided prosperity for millions, in order to appropriate India’s raw materials for its own textile industry back home and to render India a captive, submissive consumer market. This looks like a replay on a bigger scale, with India ironically poised to be a “winner” this time along with China, at the expense of the rest of Pacific Asia.
Gutman’s account inevitably raises an essential question. If we regard the workings of the capitalist marketplace with the kind of historical fatalism that once informed classical Marxism, i.e. as an invisible hand inexorably guiding historical process in an impersonal, inevitable path — then its victims are no different from the victims of any natural disaster or other uncontrollable, extra-human, nonvolitional catastrophe. And therefore our hearts and pocketbooks should open to them, and we should offer aid and sympathy and sustenance as we did for the victims of the recent tsunami. But if the workings of the marketplace are volitional and guided by human will and action, then the destruction of the livelihoods and prosperity of tens of millions, and the enormous suffering which results, must be considered deliberate and intentional — therefore criminal or at the very least criminally negligent. In which case reparations should be made and penalties assessed.
The genius of capitalist ideology (which it shares with all other religions including the more cult-like versions of communism imho) is to claim that its victims are merely the victims of “natural/historical forces”, Progress and History and all that — so no responsibility rests anywhere for their dismal fate. Meanwhile its achievements are claimed as specific, praiseworthy, creditable to human will and living proof of a superior belief system/agenda/intelligence/analysis; and the implication is that the “losers” lose by their own fault, i.e. by failing to subscribe to the revealed religion (so, once again, they deserve no reparation, help, or sympathy). Either one of these stances (the impersonal machinery of history vs the pseudo-Darwinian struggle) is invoked as need be to obfuscate the real crimes of crony capitalism, resource theft, monopoly, cartel politics, etc. Either way, millions of people are discarded as roadkill (or bycatch) on the way to some fantastical cornucopian Futurama.
Gutman’s article, I think, illuminates the essential shabbiness of this perennial shell game.
What is your point pedro? The coop. research time line on torture does have some ‘recent entries’ (just checked, last is for May 19, 2004). How does the content of that site, with which I am familiar, relate to the point I made? What am I missing, what facts am I ignoring, what do I not know about?
Their 9/11 timeline, mostly the work of Paul Thompson (and might I direct to you to his book, “The time line of terror”, which assembles the essentials of his research?) is very complete, filled with facts garnered from the mainstream press, but also, perhaps because of that, full of mistakes and contradictions. Paul is a nice guy and very thorough and well meaning. More I will not say – criticism is misplaced – he deserves praise and credit.
Posted by: Blackie | Jan 15 2005 22:35 utc | 15
Sullivan, who is rabidly anti-French and anti-European and thus, to me, a useful barometer of the transatlantic mood from the “conservatives” ‘ point of view, has come out, to his great credit, strongly and consistently against torture in the past and more so in recent days.
Posted by: Jérôme | Jan 15 2005 22:47 utc | 16
I used to read sullivan as a part of my diet of rightwing blogging. I stopped because he’s wrong: wrong about Iraq, Kerry, repub accommodations of gays, social security.
But, I plan on reading his big nyt torture piece to see what he gets wrong there.
Posted by: slothrop | Jan 15 2005 23:26 utc | 17
Sullivan from today’s blog:
Of course, it’s precisely because these guys deserve the highest of praise that we shouldn’t stint in punishing the few bad apples and insane policy directives.
I couldn’t write a more oxymoronic comment. Sort of pathetic attempt to conflate the particular (bad apples) with the universal (policy directives) so that Sully can convince himself OIF didn’t work because of some random incompetence.
I have a feeling the NYT piece will reproduce the same horseshit exculpation of the rightwing mind.
Posted by: slothrop | Jan 15 2005 23:41 utc | 18
Sullivan wonders, am I naive?:
But in a democracy, the responsibility is also wider. Did those of us who fought so passionately for a ruthless war against terrorists give an unwitting green light to these abuses? Were we naïve in believing that characterizing complex conflicts from Afghanistan to Iraq as a single simple war against ”evil” might not filter down and lead to decisions that could dehumanize the enemy and lead to abuse? Did our conviction of our own rightness in this struggle make it hard for us to acknowledge when that good cause had become endangered? I fear the answer to each of these questions is yes.
Posted by: slothrop | Jan 16 2005 0:03 utc | 19
that naiveté is normally called criminal complicity
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 16 2005 0:10 utc | 20
No point at all, Blackie. Just a link that could provide additional data to help answer one of your your opening questions. (How many have been documented?)
Posted by: pedro | Jan 16 2005 1:57 utc | 21
Bernhard et al….
I apologize if I’m late about this as I haven’t been around much recently, but…
did I hear/read something about somebody named ‘Steve’ who was ordering Mr. Graner to commit some of his atrocities?
And if so, is this perhaps the same ‘Steve’ who was so fond of hitting golfballs at folks on a nearby highway?
re your comments flashharry
“George McFarland, for example, was tried for a robbery-killing and his attorney was described by court room witnesses as having been in a deep sleep for much of the trial. In response to a suggestion that a sleeping lawyer was equivalent to ineffective assistance of counsel the trial judge was quoted as saying, quite correctly: “The Constitution doesn’t say the lawyer has to be awake.” The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals agreed with the result although a dissenting judge did hazard the observation that the majority’s conclusion was ridiculous.
Another example of Texas style defense was offered by Calvin Burdine who was also represented by sleeping counsel. In his case not only the court of criminal appeals in Texas but a panel of the Federal 5th Circuit of Appeals thought that was no big deal. Writing for the panel federal judge Edith Jones (who may soon be nominated to join Clarence Thomas and friends) said: “We cannot determine whether [defense counsel] slept during a critical stage of Burdine’s trial.” She said other equally amusing things the recounting of which space denies me. Notwithstanding Texas’s somewhat cavalier attitude towards sleeping lawyers, higher courts have intervened and both men remain alive as the wheels of justice creak along.
For all the valid criticism one can make of Mr. Gonzales’s’ legal advice to Mr. Bush in his various capacities, failing to point out to then Governor Bush that Texas defense counsel was sleeping does not reflect badly on Mr. Gonzales. That is simply part of life and death in the Texas Criminal justice system.
Christopher Brauchli is a Boulder, Colorado lawyer and and writes a weekly column for the Knight Ridder news service. He can be reached at brauchli.56@post.harvard.edu blog: hraos.blogspot.com
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 16 2005 2:08 utc | 23
Looks like they never learn. From the Observer:
Abu Ghraib abuse firms are rewarded – As prison ringleader awaits sentence, defence contractors win multi-million Pentagon contracts
Two US defence contractors being sued over allegations of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison have been awarded valuable new contracts by the Pentagon, despite demands that they should be barred from any new government work.
Posted by: Fran | Jan 16 2005 18:15 utc | 24
I haven’t seen this in the US press yet. This is from a Turkish site, an AFP article.
Mother of US soldier convicted abuses says higher-ups must be tried
Specialist Charles Graner was punished “for something he was told to do,” his mother said as her son was led away from the military courtroom in hand and leg shackles.
“You know its the higher-ups that should be on trial … they let the little guys take the fall for them. But the truth will come out eventually,” Irma Graner told journalists outside the courtroom at the Fort Hood army base in Texas.
…
“My son was convicted the day President Bush went on TV and said that seven bad apples disgraced the country. But Bush and (Defense Secretary Donald) Rumsfeld are the ones who disgraced the country,” she said.
I definitely think that Graner should be punished, what he did was inexcusable, however I do agree with his mother that he was convicted the moment Bush went on TV. I sure hope that I will live to see justice done in Hague.
Posted by: Fran | Jan 16 2005 18:23 utc | 25
“la torture d’aujourd’hui, malheureusement présente un peu partout (peut-être en italie moins qu’ailleurs), n’entretient qu’un lien de parenté formelle avec ces engins. elle n’est pas théâtrale mais secrète; ses fins ne sont ni théologiques ni cosmiques, mais bien politiques; elle est, hélas, “ratiionnelle”, et c’est avec des armes rationnelles qu’on doit la combattre. elle constitue le plus grand des maux, encore plus grave que la peine de mort; elle détruit le corps du tourmenté et l’esprit du tormenteur. en quoi cette grossière exhibition d’une autre barbarie permet-elle de l’éloigner de nous ? on peut-être certain qu’elle ne modifiera en rien l’étaat d’esprit des bourreaux potentiels. en revanche, elle ravivera le fond sadique qui gît secrètement en chacun d’entre nous”
primo levi l’asymétrie et la vie p 234
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 16 2005 18:52 utc | 26
@Fran Abu Ghraib abuse firms are rewarded but of course, isn’t this exactly the point of being a “limited liability company”, of the magical institution of the Corporation as a means of deflecting all responsibility, benefitting to the full extent from personhood under the law yet evaporating into a puff of smoke whenever wrongs have been committed and reparations are due?
btw Sullivan’s crocodile tears leave me nauseous… “Did we perhaps overreact, were we a bit hasty?” say the professional propagandists after they have stoked the fires of hell, after their lies have enjoyed devastating success. Feh.
@RossK,
Same Steve, be it Stefanowicz or Stephanowicz, from Billmon archive. It is interesting that after being fingered by the Taguba Report he apparently was never relieved of duty.
Posted by: anna missed | Jan 17 2005 4:23 utc | 29
Yes ve-e-ery interesting. So many coincidences. And they expect me to believe.
Posted by: rapt | Jan 17 2005 5:31 utc | 30