Former Abu Ghraib prisoners awarded $42 million as US army contractor discovered chargeable for serving to in torture | EUROtoday

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A U.S. jury on Tuesday awarded $42 million to a few former detainees of Iraq’s infamous Abu Ghraib jail, holding a Virginia-based army contractor liable for contributing to their torture and mistreatment twenty years in the past.

The determination from the eight-person jury got here after a special jury earlier this yr could not agree on whether or not Reston, Virginia-based CACI must be held chargeable for the work of its civilian interrogators who labored alongside the U.S. Army at Abu Ghraib in 2003 and 2004.

The jury awarded plaintiffs Suhail Al Shimari, Salah Al-Ejaili and Asa’advert Al-Zubae $3 million every in compensatory damages and $11 million every in punitive damages.

The three testified that they have been subjected to beatings, sexual abuse, compelled nudity and different merciless therapy on the jail.

They didn’t allege that CACI’s interrogators explicitly inflicted the abuse themselves, however argued CACI was complicit as a result of its interrogators conspired with army police to “soften up” detainees for questioning with harsh therapy.

CACI’s lawyer, John O’Connor, didn’t remark after Tuesday’s verdict on whether or not the corporate would attraction.

Baher Azmy, a lawyer for the Center for Constitutional Rights, which filed the lawsuit on the plaintiffs’ behalf, referred to as the decision “an important measure of Justice and accountability” and praised the three plaintiffs for his or her resilience, “especially in the face of all the obstacles CACI threw their way.”

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The trial and subsequent retrial was the primary time a U.S. jury heard claims introduced by Abu Ghraib survivors within the 20 years since photographs of detainee mistreatment — accompanied by smiling U.S. troopers inflicting the abuse — shocked the world in the course of the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

CACI had argued it wasn’t complicit within the detainees’ abuse. It stated its workers had minimal interplay with the three plaintiffs within the case and any legal responsibility for his or her mistreatment belonged to the federal government.

As within the first trial, the jury struggled to determine whether or not CACI or the Army must be held liable for any misconduct by CACI interrogators. The jury requested questions in its deliberations about whether or not the contractor or the Army bore legal responsibility.

CACI, as one in all its defenses, argued it shouldn’t be chargeable for any misdeeds by its workers in the event that they have been underneath the management and path of the Army. underneath a authorized precept often known as the “borrowed servants” doctrine.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs argued that CACI was liable for its personal workers’ misdeeds.

The lawsuit was first filed in 2008 however was delayed by 15 years of authorized wrangling and a number of makes an attempt by CACI to have the case dismissed.

Lawyers for the three plaintiffs argued that CACI was liable for his or her mistreatment even when they couldn’t show that CACI’s interrogators have been those who straight inflicted the abuse.

The proof included studies from two retired Army generals, who documented the abuse and concluded that a number of CACI interrogators have been complicit within the abuse.

Those studies concluded that one of many interrogators, Steven Stefanowicz, lied to investigators about his conduct and that he probably instructed troopers to mistreat detainees and used canine to intimidate detainees throughout interrogations.

Stefanowicz testified for CACI at trial by a recorded video deposition and denied mistreating detainees.