The first trial has been set for the abuse that prisoners at Abu Ghraib, an American-run jail in Iraq, are said to have faced on September 11, 2001. There are three guys who brought the case. They were said to be in prison.
Photos of abuse that is said to have happened in the jail came to light almost twenty years ago, during the first event that was caught on camera. After being held in prison, Suhail Najim Abdullah Al Shimari, Salah Al-Ejaili, and As’ad Al-Zuba’e, all three Iraqis, were brought to the case.
These guys have fought against CACI Premier Technology, the company that the US hired to question people. The company has been trying for years to get the case thrown out, but its most recent appeal was turned down, which is why this trial is happening now.
Katherine Gallagher, a senior attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights, said, “This is a historic trial that we hope will show some justice and help people heal from what President Bush rightly saw as shameful behavior that belied the values of the United States.”
These prisoners said they were tortured by being stripped naked, having their genitalia beaten, being put in very hot or very cold water, and getting electric shocks. They also had to deal with going hungry, being locked up alone for a year, and dogs threatening them.
A lot of other inmates have had the same thing happen to them, and they say they were never charged with a real crime. If they were found not guilty, the judge let them go.
Al-Ejaili talked about the mental and physical harm they went through, but many people didn’t believe him until the pictures came out.
“Everyone knows that people were tortured at Abu Ghraib; this is a fact that can’t be hidden or covered up,” Al-Ejaili said. He kept going. “But many people got away with it.”
