WASHINGTON - Foreigners held at a federal prison in Brooklyn after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks suffered verbal and physical abuse, with officers slamming them against the wall and twisting their arms and hands, the U.S. Justice Department's inspector general said on Thursday.

Inspector General Glenn Fine said in a 47-page report that officers also stepped on the leg-restraint chains of the detainees and punished them by keeping them restrained for long periods of time.

Videotapes showed that prison staff members slammed and pressed detainees against the wall by their heads or necks. The officers denied that it ever occurred, the report said.

Videotapes also confirmed that officers placed detainees against an American flag T-shirt with the phrase "These colors don't run" on it, which was taped to the wall in the area where detainees first arrived, according to the report.

It said the videotapes also showed that some staff members at the federal prison misused strip searches and restraints to punish detainees, and that officers improperly recorded meetings between the detainees and their lawyers.

Fine said the prison officials during the course of the investigation repeatedly said videotapes of detainee movements no longer existed. That information was wrong, and investigators discovered more than 300 videotapes.

The inspector general recommended disciplinary action against 10 current employees of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons. It said the way the officers handled some detainees was unprofessional, inappropriate and violated Bureau policy. Federal prosecutors previously had declined to bring criminal charges against the officers.

The report was a follow up to one released in June, which found "significant problems" in how authorities handled the 762 foreigners detained in cities around the United States for immigration violations during the investigation into the Sept. 11 hijacked airliner attacks.

The new report focused only on the prison in Brooklyn, where 30 detainees alleged they had been physically and verbally abused by about 20 staff members.

The report found evidence that about 16 to 20 staff members violated Bureau of Prison policy by abusing the detainees. The verbal abuse included insults, coarse language and threats of physical harm or punishment.

It said several officers at the prison provided first-hand corroboration that detainees had been mistreated, including the names of offending officers.

But other officers claimed the detainees never were pressed against or touched the wall, which the inspector general said was untrue.

"We did not find that the detainees were brutally beaten," the report said.

© Reuters Ltd 2003

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