Yasser Ebrahim, the first of the men allowed to return from Egypt under strict conditions, gave his deposition in New York on Monday.
The men, who charge they suffered inhumane and degrading treatment in a Brooklyn detention center, are being allowed to participate in the case under strict conditions, including confinement to their hotel rooms and a ban on their speaking to anybody outside the case for the duration of their stay.
The three other plaintiffs are expected to arrive in the U.S. over the next two weeks. Four other deportees are parties to the suit but are not expected to return to the U.S. for depositions
The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a civil rights advocacy group handling the case, said the conditions for their return to the U.S. are highly unusual in a civil case and a sign of what he called government "paranoia over Muslim and Middle Eastern men."
The case names former Attorney General John Ashcroft, FBI Director Robert Mueller, immigration officials and prison officers among defendants. The suit, originally filed in 2002, seeks compensation and punitive damages.
CCR legal director Bill Goodman told me, "Shortly after 9/11, the Department of Justice detained approximately 2,000 Muslim men, primarily from the Middle East and South Asia. Not one of these men was ever found to have been guilty of any form of terrorism, or even linked to terrorism. These men were held for many months longer than necessary, in solitary confinement, often physically abused and under degrading conditions. The government fought tooth and nail against any judicial oversight of what was going on. This was the beginning of what has been shown to be the U.S. policy of indefinite detention without due process, often involving torture. This lawsuit seeks to challenge and to rectify the illegal actions of the government."
The plaintiffs' claims will be bolstered by a 2003 report by Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General (IG), who found that some prison officers slammed detainees against the wall, twisted their arms and hands in painful ways, stepped on their leg restraint chains and punished them by keeping them restrained for long periods of time.
The IG's report also cited videotapes he said showed that some detention center staff "misused strip searches and restraints to punish detainees and that officers improperly and illegally recorded detainees' meetings with their attorneys."
The Federal Bureau of Prisons said it had fired two people, demoted two more and six had been suspended for periods from two days to 30 days.
"It means a lot to our clients that finally someone is being held accountable for the brutality they experienced," said CCR attorney Matthew Strugar.
"But we believe the responsibility for these abuses goes further up the chain of command at the Bureau of Prisons and we are disappointed more individuals have not yet been held accountable."
A spokesman for the Department of Justice declined to comment on the case.
The New York Times, which interviewed Yasser Ebrahim and his brother Hany in Egypt last week, reported that the two had lived in New York for several years before Sept. 11. Yasser ran a Web site design business and Hany worked in a delicatessen.
The two were arrested on Sept. 30, 2001 and held for around eight months, even after an FBI memo from Dec. 7 stated they were cleared of links to terrorist groups, the lawsuit claims.
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