Cover Up: Death At Gitmo's Camp Delta

By Steve Hynd

On June 10, 2006 three detainees at Gitmo's Camp Delta were found hanged in their cells. The government's own autopies showed they'd been hanging there for at least two hours, in cells under suposedly constant surveilance by video cameras and guards.

Now, Seton Hall Law has a new report on the deaths at Camp Delta.

Professor Denbeaux commented, “An investigation was promised. The promised investigation was a cover up. Worse still, given the gross inadequacy of the investigation the more compelling questions are: Who knew of the cover up? Who approved of the cover up, and why? The government’s investigation is slipshod, and its conclusion leaves the most important questions about this tragedy unanswered.”

Taking the military investigation’s findings as truthful and complete, in order to have committed suicide by hanging, the detainees had to:

1. Braid a noose by tearing up their sheets and/or clothing
2. Make mannequins of themselves so it would appear to the guards they were asleep in their cells
3. Hang sheets to block the view into the cells, in violation of SOPs
4. Stuff rags down their own throats
5. Tie their own feet together
6. Tie their own hands together
7. Hang the noose from the metal mesh of the cell wall and/or ceiling
8. Climb up on to the sink, put the noose around their necks and release their weight, resulting in death by strangulation
9. Hang dead for at least two hours completely unnoticed by guards

Seton Hall Law student, co-author of Death in Camp Delta, and former Sergeant in the 82nd Airborne Division, Paul W. Taylor added: “We have three dead bodies and no explanation. How is it possible that all three detainees had shoved rags so far down their own throats that medical personnel could not remove them? One of the dead detainees was scheduled for release from Guantanamo Bay in 19 days. Instead he died in custody.”

The American public and the families of the dead deserve to know the truth.”

Closing Gitmo won't make stuff like this go away, no matter how much we wish it might. The families of detainees and the entire world will remember and Gitmo will stain America's reputation until all the ghosts are put to rest. Transparency, accountability and justice must accompany the (now belated) closing of the camp.