Antonio Taguba and his report, May 2004

General Taguba

General Antonio M. Taguba was chosen to lead an inquiry into the prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib prison.  He found that "numerous incidents of sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses were inflicted on several detainees".  He concluded that the abuse was "systematic and illegal".




Taguba's report told of nude detainees with female guards taunting them and of female prisoners exposing themselves to guards.  He also described the detainees being made to perform indecent acts with each other and of guards beating and assaulting the detainees.






General Taguba was limited to investigating the 800th MPs but believed military intelligence was involved and felt like the directive came from Lieutenant General Sanchez, the Army commander in Iraq.  Taguba reported that interrogators encouraged the abuse of detainees and wanted guards to "soften them" and keep them awake at night.  He felt that the MPs were taken advantage of by intelligence and not properly trained.