Mock Executions Among CIA Torture Tactics

A report long suppressed by Bush administration officials set to be released next week says the CIA used mock executions as part of post-9/11 interrogations, Newsweek reports—though federal law prohibits threatening prisoners with “imminent death,” and the practice wasn’t authorized by the Justice Department, unlike other “enhanced” techniques like waterboarding.

A man suspected in the USS Cole bombing was threatened with a gun and a power drill during one interrogation, the report found; during another, a gunshot was fired in the room next door to make the detainee believe a fellow prisoner had been executed. The report has been ready since 2004, and has been read by some lawmakers; two former CIA heads kept it buried fearing its impact on agency morale.
(More CIA stories.)