December 19, 2006
By DAVID JOHNSTON
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18 — A Justice Department team responsible for investigating accusations of detainee abuse by civilian government employees has decided against prosecution in most of the nearly 20 cases referred in the last two years by the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency, according to lawyers who have been officially briefed on the effort.
The prosecution team, which was established in June 2004 at the United States attorney’s office in Alexandria, Va., has not brought a single indictment and has been plagued by problems.
The team has been unable to collect forensic evidence or find witnesses needed to bring indictments out of war-ravaged areas of Iraq and Afghanistan. In some cases, the unit has been stymied by the absence of facts in the referrals, according to the lawyers. A few investigations remain open, although the lawyers declined to be specific about how many cases fell in that category.
The team was set up in the aftermath of the uproar over abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq to investigate accusations that detainees were mistreated by civilian personnel. Civilians have worked in large numbers in Afghanistan and Iraq, among them C.I.A. officers, Americans hired by companies under contract with the military as interrogators and translators, and local residents temporarily employed as support workers.
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