FBI concerned at 'evidence' extracted by torture

The LA Times reported earlier in week that:

"Current and former FBI officials said ... CIA techniques resulted in false confessions that were obtained illegally.

By mid-2002, several former agents and senior bureau officials said, they had begun complaining that the CIA-run interrogation program amounted to torture and was going to create significant problems down the road -- particularly if the Bush administration was ever forced to allow the Al Qaeda suspects to face their accusers in court.

Some went to FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III, according to the former bureau officials. They said Mueller pulled many of the agents back from playing even a supporting role in the interrogations to avoid exposing them to legal jeopardy, in the belief that White House and Justice Department opinions authorizing the coercive techniques might be overturned.

"Those guys were using techniques that we didn't even want to be in the room for," one senior federal law enforcement official said. "The CIA determined they were going to torture people, and we made the decision not to be involved."

A senior FBI official who since has retired said he also complained about the lack of usable evidence and admissible statements being gathered."

Marty Lederman has some other news on the US approach to torture front, relating to a letter that 10 Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee have written to President Bush's latest nominee for Attorney General, Judge Mukasey, "daring him to continue to express agnosticism on the question of the legality of waterboarding." No Republican signed the letter.