Diane Zierhoffer
Lieutenant Colonel Diane Zierhoffer is a military pscyhologist who was a leading member of the Behavioral Science Consulting Team at the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba.[1][2] She has been criticized for her active involvement in torturing captives.
Fellow medical and mental health professionals have pointed out that the standards of their professions prohibit them from using their skills and training in any procedure that hurts rather than helps other individuals.[1]
Former prosecutors Stuart Couch and Darrel Vandeveld cited her role in making torture more distressing in their decisions that the confessions of Mohammed Slahi and Mohammed Jawad could not be relied upon.[1]
Zierhoffer was asked to observe Jawad's interrogations, by his interrogators.[2]
When called upon to testify about her role in Jawad's torture, Zierhoffer called upon the Fifth amendment to the US Constitution, and exercised her right to remain silent when her truthful testimony would require her to confess to a crime.[2]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Rozina Ali (2010-03-23). "Release of Guantanamo detainee has everything to do with torture: A judge has freed Mohamedou Ould Salahi. Some on the right want to blame ... Obama? But it's the torture, stupid". Slate magazine. http://www.salon.com/2010/03/24/slahi_release/. Retrieved 2013-04-26. "An October 17, 2003 email from a JTF-GTMO interrogator to LTC Diane Zierhoffer, a ITF-GTMO Behavioral Science Consultation Team (BSCT) Psychologist, stated that ‘Slahi told me he is “hearing voices’ now… He is worried as he knows this is not normal…. By the way… is this something that happens to people who have little external stimulus such as daylight, human interaction etc???? Seems a little creepy.’ …LTC Zierhoffer responded ‘sensory deprivation can cause hallucinations, usually visual rather than auditory, but you never know…In the dark you create things out of what little you have …’"
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Meteor Blades (2008-08-14). "Army Psychologist Pleads 'Fifth' in Case of Prisoner 900". http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/8/14/568118/-.
