Two U.S. defence contractors were involved in abuses of inmates at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad, according to a lawsuit filed in federal U.S. court yesterday seeking unspecified damages on behalf of five Iraqis who purport to be victims.
The two companies adamantly denied any improper behaviour. CACI International Inc., which provided civilian interrogators at Abu Ghraib, called the suit "a malicious and farcical recitation of false statements and intentional distortions." Titan Corp. spokesman Ralph Williams said the company believes the suit to be "baseless, and we will vigorously defend against it."
The lawsuit developed from the efforts of Australian lawyer Michael Hourigan, who said he went to Iraq with an Australian-Iraqi human-rights worker after the Abu Ghraib scandal broke in the spring.
In Baghdad, Mr. Hourigan said he interviewed the people who have become the plaintiffs in the lawsuit -- four of them allege that they were tortured and abused at the prison, and a fifth alleges that her husband died at the prison.
"Our clients are not terrorists. They're just average citizens who were caught up in the wave of interrogations that occurred right after the war," lawyer Roderick Edmond of the Atlanta firm Edmond and Jones told reporters after the filing.
Mr. Edmond said the suit was filed in Washington because the two defence contractors do business there and the court is familiar with such claims.
"We're hopeful that we will take on additional clients, additional plaintiffs," Reginald Simmons, a South Carolina lawyer involved in the suit, said.
In a videotaped deposition from Iraq played yesterday, Saddam Saleh Aboud said he endured beatings at the prison. During one session, his hood was removed and he said he saw Brigadier-General Janis Karpinski, who supervised the prison before being suspended in May. She has denied knowing about any abuses until photographs surfaced at the end of April. Neither Gen. Karpinski nor her lawyer could be reached for comment.
At least one CACI employee and one Titan employee were named in a U.S. Army report of a probe of Abu Ghraib. According to Titan and CACI, none of its employees have been charged with wrongdoing or illegal acts for work in Iraq.