He spoke of the psychologically fragile men and women who return from Iraq, to find little help or treatment offered from official circles.
Goldsmith said he had “self-medicated” for several months to treat the wounds of the war.
Another soldier told AFP he had to boost his dosage of medication to treat anxiety and social agoraphobia—two of many lingering mental wounds he carries since his deployments in Iraq—before testifying.
Some 300,000 of the 1.6 million US soldiers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from the psychological traumas of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression or both, an independent study showed last month.
A group of veterans sitting in the hearing room gazed blankly as their comrades’ testimonies shattered the official version that the US effort in Iraq is succeeding. LIKE THE 1000 YARD STARE FROM NAM?
Almost to a man, the soldiers who testified denounced serious flaws in the chain of command in Iraq.
Luis Montalvan, a former army captain, accused high-ranking US officers of numerous failures in Iraq, including turning a blind eye to massive fraud on the part of US contractors.
Ex-Marine Jason Lemieux told how a senior officer had altered a report he had written because it slammed US troops of using excessive force, firing off thousands of rounds of machine gun fire and hundreds of grenades in the face of a feeble four rounds of enemy fire.
Any comments worth posting about what these men have to say?
Or do some of you think they are just dirty rotten liars and whiny crybabies and not REAL LEAN MEAN FIGHTING FOR BUSH MACHINES? BAH!
What the last paragraph doesn’t say is how many men were involved in that fire fight.
It doesn’t take very long to fire off a couple of thousand rounds with modern weapons. Were the enemy only capable of getting four rounds off because they were forced to keep their heads down because of the volume of fire returned or did they only have four rounds with them?
It doesn’t sound like there were only a couple of our soldiers there. So you can make it sound as if they just sat and fired machine guns for hours or it more likely only lasted a matter of minutes. They didn’t break for lunch and reloaded to continue shooting at dead men. Or do you just prefer to paint it that way??
I loath and despise bush, as any thinking person does.
Normal in our society today is sick.
Thank god I am healthy.
This is neither normal nor healthy. Any thinking person should know that.
ARE YOU SURE?
Shall I put a bell on your leg? Then when it rings, you will know its being pulled.
By the way, did anyone read the article about the soldier who went before congress and told them we are being told a pack of lies?
The orginal thrust of the story?
Yeah...sure...Congress. Try the Congressional Progressive Causus. Only the Loonier Lefties need apply. All of them are Dems, but even most Democrats don’t want their names associated with it.
I haven’t had time to delve deeply into the Rand study, but one thing jumps out at me; they interviewed about 2,000 returning vets, and their extrapolation (to 300,000) is based on vets whoreported depression, flashbacks, etc. It is not based on actual expert diagnosis, so I’m gonna take it with a grain of salt, if you will.
I seem to recall that about 15 years after the Vietnam War ended, an in-depth study was made of cases of PTSD and depression among war vets and the findings revealed that the number of vets suffering from PTSD and /or depression was only about half what was reported earlier.
I loath and despise bush, as any thinking person does.
Normal in our society today is sick.
Thank god I am healthy.
This is neither normal nor healthy. Any thinking person should know that.
ARE YOU SURE?
Shall I put a bell on your leg? Then when it rings, you will know its being pulled.
By the way, did anyone read the article about the soldier who went before congress and told them we are being told a pack of lies?
The orginal thrust of the story?
Yeah...sure...Congress. Try the Congressional Progressive Causus. Only the Loonier Lefties need apply. All of them are Dems, but even most Democrats don’t want their names associated with it.
I haven’t had time to delve deeply into the Rand study, but one thing jumps out at me; they interviewed about 2,000 returning vets, and their extrapolation (to 300,000) is based on vets whoreported depression, flashbacks, etc. It is not based on actual expert diagnosis, so I’m gonna take it with a grain of salt, if you will.
I seem to recall that about 15 years after the Vietnam War ended, an in-depth study was made of cases of PTSD and depression among war vets and the findings revealed that the number of vets suffering from PTSD and /or depression was only about half what was reported earlier.
This just another group of untouchables that the left trots out and holds hearings. This is no better than using Sheehan.
And if anybody said anything they would be attacked in all maner of ways for being mean to the poor poor victim.
I wont say anything about our uniformed but the shameless use of these poor people is unforgivable. To use these poor sick people as political tools is just beyond the pale.
The shameless anti war types will use their own mothers if it suits their agenda. SHAMELESS JUST SHAMELESS.
I loath and despise bush, as any thinking person does.
Normal in our society today is sick.
Thank god I am healthy.
This is neither normal nor healthy. Any thinking person should know that.
ARE YOU SURE?
Shall I put a bell on your leg? Then when it rings, you will know its being pulled.
By the way, did anyone read the article about the soldier who went before congress and told them we are being told a pack of lies?
The orginal thrust of the story?
Yeah...sure...Congress. Try the Congressional Progressive Causus. Only the Loonier Lefties need apply. All of them are Dems, but even most Democrats don’t want their names associated with it.
I haven’t had time to delve deeply into the Rand study, but one thing jumps out at me; they interviewed about 2,000 returning vets, and their extrapolation (to 300,000) is based on vets whoreported depression, flashbacks, etc. It is not based on actual expert diagnosis, so I’m gonna take it with a grain of salt, if you will.
I seem to recall that about 15 years after the Vietnam War ended, an in-depth study was made of cases of PTSD and depression among war vets and the findings revealed that the number of vets suffering from PTSD and /or depression was only about half what was reported earlier.
This just another group of untouchables that the left trots out and holds hearings. This is no better than using Sheehan.
And if anybody said anything they would be attacked in all maner of ways for being mean to the poor poor victim.
I wont say anything about our uniformed but the shameless use of these poor people is unforgivable. To use these poor sick people as political tools is just beyond the pale.
The shameless anti war types will use their own mothers if it suits their agenda. SHAMELESS JUST SHAMELESS.
John you know what is really shameless?
America v. Alstötter et al.
("The Justice Case") 3 T.W.C. 1 (1948), 6 L.R.T.W.C. 1 (1948), 14 Ann. Dig. 278 (1948).
The Justice Trial is one of the most interesting of the Nuremberg trials. The trial of sixteen defendants, members of the Reich Ministry of Justice or People’s and Special Courts, raised the issue of what responsibility judges might have for enforcing grossly unjust--but arguably binding--laws. The trial was the inspiration for the movie Judgment at Nuremberg. The movie presented a somewhat fictionalized view of the trial.
A Commentary on the Justice Trial
Decision:U.S.A. v. ALSTOETTER ET AL. (The Justice Cases)
War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity:A Discussion of the Applicable Law
The Ex Post Facto Principle as Applied to These Cases
The Law in Action: The “Fuehrer Principle” and its Affects on the Defendant Judges
Racial Persecution: A Review of the Evidence Against the Defendants
Decision of the Court with Respect to Defendant Rothaug
Decision of the Court with Respect to Defendant Schlegelberger
Images from the Justice Trial
Lothar Kreyssig: The Judge Who Stood Up to the Nazis
View of the Justice Trial from the visitors gallery.
Trying Body: Military Tribunal III
Arraignment Date: Feb. 17, 1947
Trial Opened: March 5, 1947
Summations Concluded: October 18, 1947
Verdicts Returned: Dec. 3 and 4, 1947
Verdict: Ten of the sixteen defendants convicted, four acquitted, one died before verdict, one mistrial due to serious illness during trial.
Sentence: Four defendants sentenced to life, the other six convicted
HITLER AND SOME OF HIS SHAMELESS SUPPORT.
AND BUSH IS AND HAS DONE THE SAME TYPE OF THINGS AS FAR AS MAKING HIMSELF A TIN GOD. On the back of a flimsy legal opinon that was thrown out, as was John Yoo and the mexician nazi, Alberto gonzales.
and even more shamless are the posters who purport being such great defenders of freedom and I have been stating:
IF torture and beating detainees to death is such good policy, show us the laws, or the court cases where its use has been approved.
You know how many have show case histories or laws or bills in front of house or senate to up hold torture?
ZERO, NONE, NADA ZIP, NOT A FREAKING ONE AND I WILL BET YOU THAT YOU CANNOT EITHER.
I loath and despise bush, as any thinking person does.
Normal in our society today is sick.
Thank god I am healthy.
This is neither normal nor healthy. Any thinking person should know that.
ARE YOU SURE?
Shall I put a bell on your leg? Then when it rings, you will know its being pulled.
By the way, did anyone read the article about the soldier who went before congress and told them we are being told a pack of lies?
The orginal thrust of the story?
Yeah...sure...Congress. Try the Congressional Progressive Causus. Only the Loonier Lefties need apply. All of them are Dems, but even most Democrats don’t want their names associated with it.
I haven’t had time to delve deeply into the Rand study, but one thing jumps out at me; they interviewed about 2,000 returning vets, and their extrapolation (to 300,000) is based on vets whoreported depression, flashbacks, etc. It is not based on actual expert diagnosis, so I’m gonna take it with a grain of salt, if you will.
I seem to recall that about 15 years after the Vietnam War ended, an in-depth study was made of cases of PTSD and depression among war vets and the findings revealed that the number of vets suffering from PTSD and /or depression was only about half what was reported earlier.
This just another group of untouchables that the left trots out and holds hearings. This is no better than using Sheehan.
And if anybody said anything they would be attacked in all maner of ways for being mean to the poor poor victim.
I wont say anything about our uniformed but the shameless use of these poor people is unforgivable. To use these poor sick people as political tools is just beyond the pale.
The shameless anti war types will use their own mothers if it suits their agenda. SHAMELESS JUST SHAMELESS.
John you know what is really shameless?
America v. Alstötter et al.
("The Justice Case") 3 T.W.C. 1 (1948), 6 L.R.T.W.C. 1 (1948), 14 Ann. Dig. 278 (1948).
The Justice Trial is one of the most interesting of the Nuremberg trials. The trial of sixteen defendants, members of the Reich Ministry of Justice or People’s and Special Courts, raised the issue of what responsibility judges might have for enforcing grossly unjust--but arguably binding--laws. The trial was the inspiration for the movie Judgment at Nuremberg. The movie presented a somewhat fictionalized view of the trial.
A Commentary on the Justice Trial
Decision:U.S.A. v. ALSTOETTER ET AL. (The Justice Cases)
War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity:A Discussion of the Applicable Law
The Ex Post Facto Principle as Applied to These Cases
The Law in Action: The “Fuehrer Principle” and its Affects on the Defendant Judges
Racial Persecution: A Review of the Evidence Against the Defendants
Decision of the Court with Respect to Defendant Rothaug
Decision of the Court with Respect to Defendant Schlegelberger
Images from the Justice Trial
Lothar Kreyssig: The Judge Who Stood Up to the Nazis
View of the Justice Trial from the visitors gallery.
Trying Body: Military Tribunal III
Arraignment Date: Feb. 17, 1947
Trial Opened: March 5, 1947
Summations Concluded: October 18, 1947
Verdicts Returned: Dec. 3 and 4, 1947
Verdict: Ten of the sixteen defendants convicted, four acquitted, one died before verdict, one mistrial due to serious illness during trial.
Sentence: Four defendants sentenced to life, the other six convicted
HITLER AND SOME OF HIS SHAMELESS SUPPORT.
AND BUSH IS AND HAS DONE THE SAME TYPE OF THINGS AS FAR AS MAKING HIMSELF A TIN GOD. On the back of a flimsy legal opinon that was thrown out, as was John Yoo and the mexician nazi, Alberto gonzales.
and even more shamless are the posters who purport being such great defenders of freedom and I have been stating:
IF torture and beating detainees to death is such good policy, show us the laws, or the court cases where its use has been approved.
You know how many have show case histories or laws or bills in front of house or senate to up hold torture?
ZERO, NONE, NADA ZIP, NOT A FREAKING ONE AND I WILL BET YOU THAT YOU CANNOT EITHER.
Jim you need to step back from this a little,your starting to get fixated. You really need to let this go. If crimes were committed the law will do it’s job. You barking about it is not going to make it happen.
You can call me a NAZI all you want it doesn’t make me or any other person here a nazi. You have gotten yourself way too deep into this thing and need to work your way back.
And I’m not egging you on,I’m just a little concerned for your well being.
quoting the quoter who quoted the previous quote quoter ...
Keeps making a complete ass of himself.
This “war” will become “illegal” when Congress says it is. Until THEN, everyone who takes the military oath is bound by law to uphold it - so help me, God.
Jim you need to step back from this a little,your starting to get fixated. You really need to let this go. If crimes were committed the law will do it’s job. You barking about it is not going to make it happen.
You can call me a NAZI all you want it doesn’t make me or any other person here a nazi. You have gotten yourself way too deep into this thing and need to work your way back.
And I’m not egging you on,I’m just a little concerned for your well being.
The democrats have shamefully pandered to people like this. They have incited a hatred that in no way serves our country. It’s the only way they can win, unfortunately, because the democrats’ success lies in the failure of our military, our economy, etc. Our darkest days are always when a democrat is describing us.
The half-baked “study” by Rand doesn’t help anything. 300,000 is probably a ridiculously high number that carries with it the likelihood that it will be used fraudulently by those whose agenda is virulently Left.
That number will also be used in cases such as the HUGE headline in the AJC this morning:
The Rand study is quoted in the article. We’ll be seeing it a lot. Left-wing rags like the AJC need little excuse to post their anti-war rants. The size of the headline was ridiculous.
oj, here’s one you can cut out and post in your scrapbook.
Web Results 1 - 10 of about 122,000 for VA and PTSD, reports on numbers from Iraq war. (0.27 seconds)
[PDF] 2006 GAO Report Confirms Iraq War Veteran PTSD Health Care Is a ...File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
Oct 20, 2006 ... Vietnam War veterans with PTSD receiving care at VA centers. ... The study further found that the “VA does not know the number of veterans ...
http://www.law.uh.edu/healthlaw/perspectives/2006/(HO)PTSDCare.pdf - Similar pages
VA Studies: PTSD Care Inconsistent - CommonDreams.orgSep 17, 2007 ... The spending and quality numbers are in two reports that a VA mental .... have started going to the VA for PTSD as a result of the Iraq war, ...
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/17/3897/ - 35k - Cached - Similar pages
USATODAY.com - Trauma of Iraq war haunting thousands returning homeFeb 28, 2005 ... He was diagnosed with PTSD and is waiting for the VA to process his disability .... Fifty counselors from the latest war is a small number, ...
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2005-02-28-cover-iraq-injuries_x.htm - 74k - Cached - Similar pages
Iraq War - PTSD - PTSD in Iraq War VeteransSoldiers returning from the Iraq War and Afghanistan are showing a number of difficulties, including PTSD, alcohol and drug use, and depression.
ptsd.about.com/od/prevalence/a/IraqWarPTSD.htm - 24k - Cached - Similar pages
“NOW” on PBS Topic: PTSD «PTSD reports up 20000 in a year. By Gregg Zoroya - USA Today Posted : Friday Oct 19, 2007 9:39:11 EDT. WASHINGTON — The number of Iraq and Afghanistan war ...
olotliny.wordpress.com/2007/09/28/now-on-pbs-topic-ptsd/ - 43k - Cached - Similar pages
Think Progress » VA discouraged staff from diagnosing PTSD for ...This has happened after every conflict since the Civil War, i suspect, ... This V.A. staffer should send his kids to Iraq and not get them P.T.S.D help and ...
thinkprogress.org/2008/05/15/va-discouraged-staff-from-diagnosing-ptsd-for-compensation-seeking-veterans/ - 81k - Cached - Similar pages
U.S. GAO - SummaryCongress highlighted the importance of VA PTSD services more than 20 years ago ... Iraq War and reconstruction Afghanistan DOD Operation Iraqi Freedom Iraq ...
http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-05-287 - 12k - Cached - Similar pages
PTSD treatment readiness and the looming Iraq war PTSD bubble ...Oct 22, 2007 ... The VA’s interest in PTSD has continued steadily since this earlier .... the war is over (or when a significant number of troops come home), ...
http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=13700&cn=1 - 84k - Cached - Similar pages
This is from the VA and stories about the VA, I am a vet and I think the Vets are being treated in a shamless manner by the President and his pals, the congress.
Now here are a few places to go for furthur info, or not.
12,000 attempts of sucide per year, and the head of the va sends e-mail SHHHHHHHHH
A week of hearings in Washington on the alarming spike in suicides among veterans of the Iraq war, and an official cover-up of the numbers, has ended with both the Veterans Affairs chief and the V.A. mental health director whose advice on the matter was “Shh,” still holding their jobs.
Meanwhile, the returning soldiers “are dropping like flies.” That’s how one soldier characterized the spike in suicides among servicemen coming home from war, according to Greg Dobbs, who is completing a documentary on PTSD for HDNet and wrote an op-ed today for the Rocky Mountain News of Denver.
Dr. Ira Katz, the mental health official who ordered “Shh!” on revelations of the alarming number of suicides among U.S. veterans, won’t lose his job over it, his boss told Congress. The poor fellow, like all of us from time to time, just wrote without thinking in an e-mail, V.A. Secretary James Peake testified.
Katz agreed that it was just a bad choice of words when he sent his colleagues an e-mail about suicide data that started out with “Shh!” in the subject line. The e-mail (which I covered in-depth last week) went on to admit that 12,000 veterans a year attempt suicide while under department treatment—but this number should be kept from CBS News, which was studying the issue. “Is this something we should (carefully) address ourselves in some sort of release before someone stumbles on it?” the e-mail asked.
Dr. Katz told the House Veterans Affairs Committee that the e-mail had a poor tone—even though the body contained “appropriate, healthy dialogue” about the data. “I deeply regret the subject line,” Katz said. “It was an error and I apologize for that.”
After the hearing, Peake told reporters he did not plan to fire Katz or other officials over the e-mails. He said everyone has sent an embarrassing e-mail at some point. “It truly was an unfortunate set of words,” Peake said. Peake said the reason the data discussed in the e-mail about the number of suicide attempts was not released was because of concerns about its accuracy.
White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said President Bush has “full confidence in Secretary Peake and believes that he is handling it appropriately.”
The committee’s chairman, Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA) accused Katz of being more concerned about how data was interpreted than the health of veterans. He also said Katz—as well as others involved—should be fired. He accused the agency of criminal negligence in the handling of data about the number of veterans who have committed suicide, and of having a history of cover-ups.
Dobbs, in his op-ed today, reveals that in his HDNet documentary he interviewed one young infantryman who went to Iraq from Fort Carson, and had seen friends blown up and himself crushed by “survivor’s guilt.” He “came home diagnosed with PTSD. But when I asked him to describe his treatment, he laughed and said, ‘Didn’t exist.’ Even when he got ‘mental health’ appointments, his line commanders made him work so he’d miss them. Eventually, he took a kitchen knife and cut his wrists. He was saved, but six hours after being released from the psych ward, he was sent back to his unit to train for redeployment to Iraq.
“A Marine out of Camp Pendleton told us he came back with PTSD and was put on overnight guard duty - armed. He called his mother one night with a gun in his mouth, telling her he had killed so many innocent Iraqis, he didn’t deserve to live. She kept him on the phone, praying neither battery would die, as she drove six hours to save him.”
Ex-Marine Jason Lemieux told how a senior officer had altered a report he had written because it slammed US troops of using excessive force, firing off thousands of rounds of machine gun fire and hundreds of grenades in the face of a feeble four rounds of enemy fire.
Any comments worth posting about what these men have to say?
Or do some of you think they are just dirty rotten liars and whiny crybabies and not REAL LEAN MEAN FIGHTING FOR BUSH MACHINES? BAH!
Excessive force? Firing too many rounds and grenades? Well let’s see here. Here’s a brief recap of a few of the Marine Corps common weapons, and their fire rates:
M240Golf: a 7.62 MM (roughly equivalent to 30 calibre) belt fed machine gun. Its the standard on Hummers. It fires between 650 and 950 rounds per minute.
M249 The squad automatic weapon or “SAW” uses the standard M16 round, but fires at between 750 to 1000 rounds per minute. As Bing West notes, this weapon can cut an enemy in half.
Mark 19 grenade launcher: fires the 40MM grenade round that is also used in the M203. Firing rate for this weapon is 40-60 rounds per minute.
One possible reason why there were only a “feeble four rounds” of enemy fire is that the enemy died in a hail of rounds being sent down range by well trained, lethal American Marines.
My goodness, talk about feeble. This is just foolishness from pops.
He spoke of the psychologically fragile men and women who return from Iraq, to find little help or treatment offered from official circles.
Goldsmith said he had “self-medicated” for several months to treat the wounds of the war.
Another soldier told AFP he had to boost his dosage of medication to treat anxiety and social agoraphobia—two of many lingering mental wounds he carries since his deployments in Iraq—before testifying.
Some 300,000 of the 1.6 million US soldiers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from the psychological traumas of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression or both, an independent study showed last month.
A group of veterans sitting in the hearing room gazed blankly as their comrades’ testimonies shattered the official version that the US effort in Iraq is succeeding. LIKE THE 1000 YARD STARE FROM NAM?
Almost to a man, the soldiers who testified denounced serious flaws in the chain of command in Iraq.
Luis Montalvan, a former army captain, accused high-ranking US officers of numerous failures in Iraq, including turning a blind eye to massive fraud on the part of US contractors.
Ex-Marine Jason Lemieux told how a senior officer had altered a report he had written because it slammed US troops of using excessive force, firing off thousands of rounds of machine gun fire and hundreds of grenades in the face of a feeble four rounds of enemy fire.
Any comments worth posting about what these men have to say?
Or do some of you think they are just dirty rotten liars and whiny crybabies and not REAL LEAN MEAN FIGHTING FOR BUSH MACHINES? BAH!
What the last paragraph doesn’t say is how many men were involved in that fire fight.
It doesn’t take very long to fire off a couple of thousand rounds with modern weapons. Were the enemy only capable of getting four rounds off because they were forced to keep their heads down because of the volume of fire returned or did they only have four rounds with them? Terrorists with four rounds? Surely you jest.
It doesn’t sound like there were only a couple of our soldiers there. So you can make it sound as if they just sat and fired machine guns for hours or it more likely only lasted a matter of minutes. They didn’t break for lunch and reloaded to continue shooting at dead men. Or do you just prefer to paint it that way??
I posted what the man said. That is all, since I was not there.
However, I suspect he told the truth as he knows it or beleives its the truth.
<snip>
Ex-Marine Jason Lemieux told how a senior officer had altered a report he had written because it slammed US troops of using excessive force, firing off thousands of rounds of machine gun fire and hundreds of grenades in the face of a feeble four rounds of enemy fire.
Any comments worth posting about what these men have to say?
Or do some of you think they are just dirty rotten liars and whiny crybabies and not REAL LEAN MEAN FIGHTING FOR BUSH MACHINES? BAH!
What the last paragraph doesn’t say is how many men were involved in that fire fight.
It doesn’t take very long to fire off a couple of thousand rounds with modern weapons. Were the enemy only capable of getting four rounds off because they were forced to keep their heads down because of the volume of fire returned or did they only have four rounds with them? Terrorists with four rounds? Surely you jest.
It doesn’t sound like there were only a couple of our soldiers there. So you can make it sound as if they just sat and fired machine guns for hours or it more likely only lasted a matter of minutes. They didn’t break for lunch and reloaded to continue shooting at dead men. Or do you just prefer to paint it that way??
I posted what the man said. That is all, since I was not there.
However, I suspect he told the truth as he knows it or beleives its the truth.
“...or believes it’s the truth.”??? Sounds like a man right up your alley.
(CNN)—A U.S. soldier who deserted to Canada will not face persecution if he returns to the United States, Canada’s refugee agency ruled Wednesday. National Guardsman Corey Glass says he fled to Canada to avoid combat in the Iraq war, which he doesn’t support.
Perhaps not persecution, but PROSECUTION is certainly warranted. They are going to LOVE him all day and all night at Leavenworth!
Military prisons LOVE liberal pu$$ies who volunteer to serve and then “believe” the sh1t the left shovels “...is the truth”. All those fresh, young, tight things! Think after a few nights at Leavenworth, these “objectors” will be wishing the military still shot deserters?
I am waiting for a “but the left lied to me” defense.
From Army News Service, for About.com
By Beth Reece
THERE are two kinds of Soldiers at the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. — the ones with no rank or pay, and those with keys.
Handcuffs and steel doors keep the inmates confined, but it’s the tenacity of corrections specialists that cramps inmates’ potential for trouble.
The USDB is the only maximum-security prison within the Department of Defense. Of 440 male inmates, six are currently on death row and 10 are serving life without parole. Female felons are locked away at the Naval Consolidated Brig in San Diego, Calif.
“Unless something unusual happens, this is a very calm environment. But these are bad guys, and in several cases they committed some pretty hideous crimes. That’s all we need to know to stay vigilant,” said COL James W. Harrison Jr., commandant of the USDB.
Confinement
Prisoners’ lives are molded by the degree of supervision needed to minimize risk to others. Custody grades include installation trusty, minimum, minimum inside only, medium and maximum.
The special-housing unit is reserved for inmates who could be locked up 23 hours a day. Food is slid into cells through narrow slots, and a small window at the foot of each door lets the guards, known within the USDB as correctional specialists, chain inmates’ ankles before they’re escorted out for showers or fresh air.
I wanted to post some pics of the old prison, the new facility was built in 2002, but it appears as though the Army has had pictures of the ancient dungeon removed from many websites. Like Alcatraz, some day they’ll be giving tours of the place.
