Tapes’ Destruction Hovers Over Detainee Cases

WASHINGTON — When officers from the Central Intelligence Agency destroyed hundreds of hours of videotapes documenting harsh interrogations in 2005, they may have believed they were freeing the government and themselves from potentially serious legal trouble.

But nearly four months after the disclosure that the tapes were destroyed, the list of legal entanglements for the C.I.A., the Defense Department and other agencies is only growing longer. In addition to criminal and Congressional investigations of the tapes’ destruction, the government is fighting off challenges in several major terrorism cases and a raft of prisoners’ legal claims that it may have destroyed evidence.

The United States hasn’t exactly triumphed in court with terrorism cases, but now, with the deliberate destruction of evidence, its virtually assured that no one will be convicted of a terrorism-related charge unless the feds first manage to prove they didn’t tamper with the evidence. In fact, in would be cheaper to probably just let anyone awaiting trial with a Middle Eastern surname go free than risk getting hammered in court for the world to see.

We can’t even do kangaroo courts right. Pathetic.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 31st, 2008 at 6:02 am and is filed under Points to Ponder. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.