Torture Americana....

From an ACLU presser I just got (emphasis mine):

"Memo Contends That President Can Authorize Torture

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 1, 2008

CONTACT: Laurie Gindin Beacham or James Freedland, (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

 NEW YORK – A secret memo authored by the Department of Justice (DOJ) asserting that President Bush has unlimited power to order brutal interrogations to extract information from detainees was declassified today as a result of an American Civil Liberties Union Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. The memo, written by John Yoo, then a deputy at the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), was sent to the Defense Department in March 2003. 

“Senior officials at the Justice Department gave the Pentagon the green light to torture prisoners,” said Amrit Singh, an ACLU staff attorney. “It is outrageous that none of these high-level officials have been brought to task yet for their role in authorizing prisoner abuse.”
 
A similar OLC memo asserting the same kind of unchecked executive authority was sent to the CIA in August 2002. In that now-notorious document, torture was defined so narrowly that it encompassed only those methods that result in pain akin to that associated with "death, organ failure or the permanent impairment of a significant body function." 

In many respects, the March 2003 memo released today parrots the advice previously given to the CIA. In other ways, however, the 2003 memo goes even further. For example, it argues – without any qualification – that, during wartime, the president’s Commander-in-Chief power overrides the due process guarantee of the Fifth Amendment.
 
“The memo shows that the same disgraceful legal analysis that was at the root of the CIA’s illegal interrogation program was also at the root of the Defense Department’s program,” said Jameel Jaffer, Director of the ACLU National Security Project. “The memo takes an extremely broad view of the president’s power as Commander-in-Chief. If you believe this memo, there is no limit at all to the kinds of interrogation methods the President can authorize.” 
 
In the memo released today, Yoo writes: “If a government defendant were to harm an enemy combatant during an interrogation in a manner that might arguably violate a criminal prohibition, he would be doing so in order to prevent further attacks on the United States by the al Qaeda terrorist network.” The memo goes on to say, “In that case, we believe that he could argue that the executive branch’s constitutional authority to protect the nation from attack justified his actions.”

The memo was declassified in response to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU, the New York Civil Liberties Union, and other organizations in June 2004 to enforce Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for records concerning the treatment of prisoners in U.S. custody abroad. The ACLU has been fighting for the release of the March 2003 Yoo memo since filing the lawsuit. A few weeks ago, after the court ordered additional briefing on whether the Defense Department could continue to withhold the memo, the government reluctantly agreed to conduct a declassification review by March 31. The Defense Department released this memo after conducting the review.
 
The March 2003 Yoo memo also sheds considerable light on the development of interrogation methods for use at Guantánamo Bay and elsewhere. In a recently published book, Administration of Torture, ACLU attorneys Jaffer and Singh explain that, in early 2003, a Defense Department working group convened by then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was supplied with the March 2003 Yoo memo and told that it should regard the memo as “definitive guidance.” Relying on the Yoo memo, the working group ultimately endorsed a slew of harsh interrogation methods, some of which violated U.S. and international law. Secretary Rumsfeld relied on the working group memo to authorize a new interrogation directive for use at Guantánamo Bay.  General Geoffrey Miller, who was in charge of Guantánamo, was later sent to Iraq to encourage the adoption of abusive methods there. 

In Administration of Torture, Jaffer and Singh write that interrogation practices sanctioned at the highest levels of the Bush administration led to the system abuse and torture of prisoners in U.S. custody. More information about the book is available online at: www.aclu.org/administrationoftorture

To date, more than 100,000 pages of government documents have been released in response to the ACLU’s FOIA lawsuit. The ACLU has been posting these documents online at: www.aclu.org/torturefoia

Attorneys in the FOIA case are Lawrence S. Lustberg and Melanca D. Clark of the New Jersey-based law firm Gibbons, P.C.; Jaffer, Singh and Judy Rabinovitz of the ACLU; Arthur Eisenberg and Beth Haroules of the New York Civil Liberties Union; and Shayana Kadidal and Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights."

John Yoo is a professor at Berkley, despite seemingly being totally unqualified to practice law, let alone teach it. He is also a war criminal. Please contact Berkley to let them know just how you feel about a war criminal teaching classes to students on international law - which he broke. Now go forth and make me proud girls and boys. Get your pens ready...

Here is Yoo's contact information at the school:
John Choon Yoo
Title: Professor of Law
Office: 890 Simon Hall
Tel: 510-643-5089
Fax: 510-642-3728
Email Address: jyoo@law.berkeley.edu


Here is the contact information for the whole administrative staff of the law school.

Christopher Edley, Jr.
Dean; Professor of Law
edley@law.berkeley.edu

Stephen McG. Bundy '78
Associate Dean; Professor of Law
436 Boalt Hall (North Addition)
Tel: 510-642-1970
Fax: 510-643-2673
bundys@law.berkeley.edu

Richard M. Buxbaum '53
Associate Dean, J.D. Program; Jackson H. Ralston Professor of International Law
888 Simon Hall
Tel: 510-642-1771
Fax: 510-642-3728
bux@law.berkeley.edu

Howard A. Shelanski '92
Associate Dean, J.D. Program; Professor of Law; Director, Berkeley Center for Law & Technology
Tel: 510-643-2743
Fax: 510-642-3767
334 Boalt Hall (North Addition)
shelanski@law.berkeley.edu

Jonathon Simon
Associate Dean, Jurisprudence and Social Policy Program; Professor of Law
510-643-5169, Fax: 510-643-2673
JSP Building
jsimon@law.berkeley.edu

Stephen Sugarman
Associate Dean, J.D. Program; Agnes Roddy Robb Professor of Law
510-642-3856
327 Boalt Hall (North Addition)
sugarman@law.berkeley.edu

Marilyn Byrne
Chief of Staff
510-643-3519
215 Boalt Hall
mbyrne@law.berkeley.edu

Elaine Mui
Event Coordinator
510-642-9919
215D Boalt Hall
emui@law.berkeley.edu

Syreeta Shepherd
Executive Assistant to the Dean
510-642-0259
215 Boalt Hall
sshepherd@law.berkeley.edu

Aimee Tabor
Faculty Appointments Coordinator
510-643-3056
215D Boalt Hall
atabor@law.berkeley.edu

Comments

[Joe Bigby]

The torture memos were not all Yoo was engaged in to subvert the Constitution. He specifically declared 9/11 as an act of war, thus freeing the event from criminal investigation. This is obstruction of justice. He then violated the very rules of war by violating the Geneva Conventions Article 3 that specifically protects ANYONE from abusive treatment, i.e. Torture. John C. Yoo needs to face criminal charges as well as charges of Treason and War Crimes!

[charles feldman]

This is such an important story, I have supplied a link on my blog to yours so people can have access to the email addresses of Yoo and others at his law school; I encourage all of good will to email Yoo and school officials and let them know how they feel.

Thanks for taking the time to post the addresses.

RESPONSE FROM LARISA ALEXANDROVNA
Thanks for posting a link. You have not included your own, so I will so that people who visit here can visit your site as well: http://www.thefeldmanblog.com

[Where did you get this]

Hey Larisa what a surprise this torture memo must be for you uh? Larisa put an end to this shame girl. Merci.