By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A federal jury on Tuesday discovered U.S. protection contractor CACI Worldwide chargeable for its position in torture on the Abu Ghraib jail close to Baghdad through the Iraq warfare and ordered it to pay $42 million in damages.
The jury’s verdict discovered the Virginia-based firm liable within the torture of Iraqi males on the jail in 2003-2004 and ordered it to pay every of the three plaintiffs $14 million in damages, the Middle for Constitutional Rights, which represented the plaintiffs, mentioned in a press release.
Tuesday’s verdict marked the primary time a civilian contractor was held legally answerable for the torture on the jail.
The torture of prisoners held by U.S. forces through the Iraq warfare on the facility turned a scandal throughout former President George W. Bush’s administration after footage of the abuse emerged in 2004.
The images confirmed U.S. troops smiling, laughing and giving thumbs up as prisoners had been compelled into humiliating positions together with a unadorned human pyramid and simulated intercourse. Detainees mentioned they endured bodily and sexual abuse, infliction of electrical shocks and mock executions.
CACI denies its staff engaged in torture and mentioned it is going to attraction Tuesday’s verdict, calling it disappointing. CACI staff labored as interrogators on the jail beneath contract with the U.S. authorities.
The three Iraqi plaintiffs – Suhail Al Shimari, Salah Al-Ejaili and As’advert Al-Zuba’e – mentioned CACI interrogators would direct navy personnel to “soften up” detainees earlier than they had been questioned, resulting in abuses throughout the power.
The plaintiffs had been ultimately launched with out cost.
A CACI spokesperson mentioned the corporate has been “wrongly subjected to long-term, destructive affiliation with the unlucky and reckless actions of a gaggle of navy police at Abu Ghraib jail from 2003 via 2004.”
The U.S. invasion of Iraq, which adopted lies that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and killed a whole lot of hundreds, led to widespread international condemnation.
