U.S. Captain Hears Pleas for Afghan Detainee

New York Times ^ | 5/24/09 | Richard A. Oppel, Jr.

[steve-b]

Capt. Kirk Black, who trains the Afghan police in this impoverished province, developed a practiced skepticism about claims of innocence during a decade as a Baltimore police officer.

But last January, when relatives of an Afghan imprisoned at the Bagram military detention center begged him to look into the case, he agreed to listen. Eventually he became convinced that the detention was a case of mistaken identity and put the family in touch with a lawyer.

Soon, Captain Black was facing a potential legal battle of his own....

Captain Black's involvement in the Bagram detainee's case began in January, while the American officer was attending a meeting of village elders and leaders. He was approached by relatives of an Afghan named Gul Khan, who they said had been snatched by American troops in September and imprisoned at Bagram Air Field, north of Kabul. The military apparently believed Mr. Khan was a Taliban leader named Qari Idris. But local Afghan officials told Captain Black it was a case of mistaken identity. Captain Black, believing that he was fulfilling a policy of the American counterinsurgency by trying to hear out locals with grievances, applied his police training to the evidence he heard.

"Upon speaking to multiple village elders, family members, the police chief and the subgovernor, I am convinced that the individual in question is not the person that the government claims," he wrote in January... "I am a police officer in the United States, and there is a mass of evidence that this individual does not need to be held."

In March, Captain Black said, he was ordered by a commander several rungs above him to "toe the party line" and not discuss Mr. Khan's guilt or innocence....

[bgill]

When they all have the same beard and turban, mis-identity happens.

[steve-b]

Mistakes are one thing. Corrupt cover-ups to sweep them under the rug are something else.

[bgill]

True.