CIA Says It Has 3,000 Documents Related to Destroyed Interrogation Tapes

On Friday, the CIA today disclosed that it has a list of roughly 3,000 summaries, transcripts, reconstructions and memoranda relating to 92 interrogation videotapes that were destroyed by the agency. The CIA refused, however, to disclose the list to the public. The agency also refused to publicly disclose a list of witnesses who may have viewed the videotapes or retained custody of the videotapes before their destruction. In place of the expected list of documents, the DOJ submitted this letter to U.S. District Court Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein of the Southern District of New York.

Earlier this month, the CIA acknowledged it destroyed 92 tapes of interrogations. The tapes, some of which reportedly show CIA operatives subjecting suspects to extremely harsh interrogation methods, should have been identified and processed for the ACLU in response to its Freedom of Information Act request demanding information on the treatment and interrogation of prisoners held in U.S. custody abroad. The tapes were also withheld from the 9/11 Commission, which had formally requested that the CIA hand over transcripts and recordings documenting the interrogation of CIA prisoners.

In December 2007, the ACLU filed a motion to hold the CIA in contempt for its destruction of the tapes. As part of that case, in August 2008 Judge Hellerstein issued an order requiring the agency to produce “a list of any summaries, transcripts, or memoranda regarding the [destroyed tapes] and of any reconstruction of the records’ contents” as well as a list of witnesses who may have viewed the videotapes or retained custody of the videotapes before their destruction. The DOJ’s letter on Friday was in response to that order. The agency must still turn over the list of documents for an in camera review by the court on March 26.

The CIA’s use of torture is well-known and documented, but the government continues to withhold information about these tapes from the public. Full disclosure of the CIA’s illegal interrogation methods is long overdue and the agency must be held accountable for breaking the law.