Where Are Lynndie England and Charles Graner Now?

   Lynndie England is living at home in the rural town on Fort Ashby, West Virginia. England has lived in the town since she was a toddler. Although England has been released from confinement after being sentenced to 3 years, she is not free by any means. Psychologically, Lynndie fights demons regarding her actions in Abu Ghraib, her current living situation in a trailer with her parents and her 4 year old son, her lack of ability to find a job, and her reputation around town.
   England has not been able to find work for several reasons. She is classified as a felon, which greatly limits her opportunities for work. Even if she gets past that initial step, her reputation precedes her and gives a strong prejudice from perspective employers.
   England has a four year old boy that was fathered by Charles Graner, who was also a major offender at Abu Ghraib. They are no longer in a relationship.
   The local townspeople often hassle England about Abu Ghraib, ironically some appearing to support her actions. England also seems to not regret any more than being arrested and charged for her actions. She does not appear remorseful for the pain she has caused in any way since her torment was inflicted on the enemy of the United States, the Iraqis.
  In Kansas, Charles Graner was released 6 1/2 years into his 10 year sentence for good behavior. He is married to Megan Ambhul, another soldier involved with Abu Ghraib. He has expressed interest to England about receiving visitation time with their son.

The Senate Armed Services Committee Report on Treating of Detainees in December 2008

  The Senate Armed Services Committee Report on the Treatment of Detainees made several specifications concerning the maltreatment at Abu Grhaib. It tied in several factors that subsequently contributed to the actions made by the U.S. soldiers.
  Sequentially, one of the first factors that was addressed was President Bush's decision to not abide by the guidelines of the Geneva Convention. If our soldiers had been required to follow the Geneva Convention's guidelines, the inhumane treatment may have been less severe. Although the guidelines are decidedly vague and easily misconstrued, abiding by the guidelines would have been more appropriate than not.
  The report also addressed the perspective of terrorists of al Qaeda and the Taliban. These terrorists are trained and passionate in the belief that the United States is an immediate threat to Islam. The abuse, torment, and torture  inflicted by the U.S. soldiers has only added fuel to that fire.
  With an intention of convincing U.S. soldiers to resist capture during wartime, soldiers are introduced to SERE tactics. These tactics, consisting of several physically and psychologically stressful strategies, were never meant nor should they had been approved to be used by U.S. soldiers. It was found that soldiers were ordered to use those tactics by senior officials, including Donald Rumsfeld, who now deny any wrong-doing.

Antonio Taguba and his report, May 2004

   In Antonio Taguba's report in 2004, there were several reasons given to explain how the abuse at Abu Ghraib came to begin. Taguba compared three similar camps. His findings were that the other camps were in fact praticing lawfully under the Geneva Conventions. This did not apply to Abu Ghraib.
   Along with the lack of training of the police, there was a lack of presence of higher level officers, such as General Karpinski.
    General Taguba found that the problems occurred do to the failure of leaderhip. There was a lack of presence of commanding officers as well, specifically General Karpinski. It was actually found that Karpinski was untruthful about the frequency of her visits; the visits were far less than reported.
    It was also found that a lack of training was a cause of the tormenting of prisoners. There was no training prior to arriving in Iraq. Along with lack of training, it was also noted that there was no communication inbetween shifts happening amongst the military police. This caused a huge hole in the understanding of the progress and status of prisoners.
   Within the report, a list of harsh tactics, including unmuzzled guard dogs, was provided. Sleep deprivation, solitary confinement, and stress positions are examples of other tactics used.
   Though there was no written evidence of direct orders from commanding officers for the abuse to be used against detainees, Taguba was convinced that the orders were in fact given.

The film The Ghosts of Abu Ghraib

   The horrendous acts of eleven United States soldiers were leaked after a soldier by the name of Darby borrowed a couple of picture files to get some memorable photos of the country. After all, the soldiers had seen several landmarks while being stationed in Iraq. The soldier was surprised to find photos of the soldiers abusing prisoners, and he turned them in to higher ranking officers. The soldier was told that he would be anonymous for his safety, yet he was given national credit by Rumseld, so Darby had to immediately leave the area in fear of retaliation.
  The eleven soldiers were punished for their crimes; the charges ranged from a demotion in rank to a ten year sentence. The soldiers strongly felt that if the photos had not leaked, noone would have been punished for the treatment of the prisoners. The eleven soldiers were at fault, however, there were definitely puppet masters from the States that were giving orders and signing consents that allowed and pushed the soldiers to behave the way that they did. In order to escape public judgement and consequences, the Department of Defense used the spiderweb of correspondences and responsilbities within the levels and departments of the Bush Adminstration to mask the truth of who was involved.

What happened at Abu Ghraib?

   Abu Ghraib, a prison once utilized by the regime of Saddam Hussein as a chamber of torture and execution, was hypocritically cleaned up and converted by the United States military into a physical and psychological torture camp. As thousands of Iraqi citizens were expediently arrested and detained, the ratio of prison police to prisoner rapidly increased.
   As the numbers of prisoners increased, so did the levels of expectation from the Bush Administration in regards to incoming intelligence. The Secretary of Defense had already signed and specified the types of consequences that were deemed appropriate to inflict on prisoners. The severe tactics (nakedness, sexual ridicule, harassment, physical and emotional strain) fell into a gray area in the Geneva Conventions, which President Bush had already separated the war from due to the nature of the wanted terrorist group. It can be implied that this gray area commenced the domino effect of abuse of the Iraqi detainees.
   It would appear that Abu Ghraib displayed a catastrophic example of peer pressure in regards to the guards. The guards saw horrible abuse inflicted on prisoners, and those guards began to conduct the same sorts of procedures. The few reports that did make it to superiors were ignored, while those conducting the worst of the abuse were commended. Prisoners were dragged down hallways completely naked, chained and left hungry and naked, forced into sexually humiliating positions, tortured with loud sounds and bright lights, and harassed constantly.
  In fall 2003, there was a prison riot from distressed prisoners. The prisoners were harshly punished, and at that point, it would appear that if the military police had any previous regard for humanity or reservations about the punishment, those reservations were lifted. The abuse quickly escalated.
    One person was reported dead as a result of a homicide.Another was reported to be punched in the chest extremely hard. The prisoner was close to cardiac arrest. Prisoners were denied the care of doctors as well.
   During the interrogations, the abuse continued. The prisoners were abused to coerse them into giving information before the interrogation. During the interrogation, the level of torture increase significantly.

  

Military Police Moved from Incarceration Staff and Placed Under Military Intelligence (MI)

After Geoffrey Miller's visit to the prison, the military police were reclassified as being part of interrogation. Those who were reassigned were ordered to make specific prisoners miserable by use of psychological torture. The group was given orders to deprive prisoners of sleep, yell at them, play loud music, and use stress positions for long periods of time. These are only a small amount of examples of the use of psychological torture that the prisoners of Abu Ghraib endured. The military police began to question whether they should follow orders or do what is ethically right.

Major General Geoffrey Miller, Donald Rumsfeld, Ricardo Sanchez and Interrogation Techniques

   Geoffrey Miller turned Guantanamo Bay from a functioning prison into a prison that implemented extremely harsh techniques that eventually led to the prison being shut down. There are official documents from FBI agents that witnessed the techniques that descibed prisoners nude, chained and forced to remain in a stressful position, often soiling themselves and left for almost an entire day with no food or water.
  Rumsfeld signed and approved the techniques that Geoffrey Miller used. He approved the harshest strategies for extracting intelligence in the history of the United States. He sent Miller to Iraq in August 2003 to increase the incoming intelligence from prisoners.
   When Miller arrived, he explained that the prisoners needed to be treated like dogs, and he felt the prisoners had been treated too well so far. Ricardo Sanchez sent out a memo on September 14, 2003 that explained the harsh tactics that could be used. Since the infomation and memos coming from superiors were inconsistent, the guards at Abu Ghraib were confused about tactics that were approved or not approved.