Nonsense! Once an individual has enlisted, he/she is certainly not free to “quit at any time.” Wherever did you learn to think, Counselor?

You can quit SERE school at any time and don’t tell me you can’t. Soldires, sailors and marines are not legally in custody or physical control. That is why the statute does not apply to them, not because of specific intent.

The fact that you are gathering information does not negate the specific intent of inflicting severe physical or mental pain or suffering. As a lawyer you should know that.

Gauntlet thrown, gauntlet accepted, now I’m gonna beat you bloody with the gauntlet.

Here, this should clarify all of the arguing on this thread:

The controlling case defining “specific intent” under federal law is United States v. Bailey, 444 U.S. 394 (1980). Bailey states: “In a general sense, ‘purpose’ corresponds loosely with the common-law concept of specific intent, while ‘knowledge’ corresponds loosely with the concept of general intent.” Id. at 405.

There you have it. If the CIA agent “knows” that his information gathering will inflict sever pain, then you have general intent. If his main “purpose” is to inflict pain, then you have specific intent.

So if your main purpose is information gathering, there is no specific intent to torture, just general.

Please make all subsequent arguments to the Supreme Court as it is not within my power to overturn Bailey.

There you have it. If the CIA agent “knows” that his information gathering will inflict sever pain, then you have general intent. If his main “purpose” is to inflict pain, then you have specific intent.

That is incorrect counselor. His purpose is to inflict the pain to get a confession. He is not doing this knowlingly, he is doing it purposefully.

When you do something knowingly you know or should know what the results of your actions are.

When you do something purposefully you intend the results.

In the cases we are discussing the interrogators intend to cause severe mental or physical pain or suffering because that is what they believe drives results. Knowingly is a subset of purposefully. Everything done purposefully is done knowingly, but everything done knowingly is not done purposefully.

Do you really believe that if an interogator cut off a suspects finger to gain information it is not torture?

Did you read the case you quoted?

It is about a Nazi who was being deported to Germany to stand trial for the murder of 29,000 people. He claimed that we were torturing him by deporting him because we knew what was likely to happen to him in Germany.

That is a good example of general intent. The US’s intent was to deport him to stand trial. Even if we knew what would likely happen to him it clearly was not our intent.

However, that is not what we are discussing here.

But thanks for showing that Eric Holder does know the difference between general and specific intent.

Ah, our soi dissant veteran and jd returns to spread ignorance…

I am less ignorant than anybody who thinks that torture isn’t torture as long as the intent is to get information.

I am certainly less ignorant than you.

Lioncourt, the fact that it is done during interrogation for the purpose of eliciting information and not for the purpose of torturing someone is precisely what makes it a specific intent crime.

Specific intent goes to whether you intended the result of the action, not the reason for you doing the action. In the case of torture it is whether you intended to inflict severe mental or physical pain or suffering. The fact that you are doing it to get information is not a defense to whether you intended to inflict severe mental or physical pain or suffering. Under your theory you could cut off a persons fingers and it wouldn’t be torture as long as you did it during interrogation. It is a ridiculous theory, this is 1L stuff and you should be embarrassed for posting that somebody else didn’t understand it. I have no idea whether Eric Holder doesn’t understands this, but I certainly know that you don’t.

Bullshit indeed. There is no exception under the law for torture because the ‘victim’ volunteered for it.

Read the law, you have to be in custody or physical control. There are legal definitions for those, maybe you should look up those too.

You do not have a promising legal career ahead of you. Neither does Eric Holder if he tries to prosecute anyone…
Rule 3.1 Meritorious Claims and Contentions
A lawyer shall not bring or defend a proceeding, or assert or controvert an issue therein, unless there is a basis in law and fact for doing so that is not frivolous, which includes a good faith argument for an extension, modification or reversal of existing law. A lawyer for the defendant in a criminal proceeding, or the respondent in a proceeding that could result in incarceration, may nevertheless so defend the proceeding as to require that every element of the case be established.
He would be sanctioned and/or disbarred under Rules 3.1 and 8.4 respectively.

No I wouldn’t because I am right about this issue. The fact that you are gathering information does not negate the specific intent of inflicting severe physical or mental pain or suffering. As a lawyer you should know that.

No no, I am quite sure I even put the phrase ‘specific intent’ right in the title of this post.

Right, but all the cases you cite are not about interrogators. They are about returning a war criminal or with the Haitians the conditions prisoners are kept in.

It is a difficult proposition to find a situation in which an interrogator does not intend to inflict the pain he is inflicting during interrogation. Interrogations meet the definition of specific intent. They intend to create the pain and that is how they get a response.

When you clear away the bullshit being peddled by the Dems on this subject, and go to the facts, you find two things:

One, waterboarding, the way we do it, is not “torture”, by any meaningful definition of the word.

Two, waterboarding, the way we do it, is incredibly effective in getting information in a timely manner. As such, it makes real torture obsolete.
The reason our enemies practice real torture is that they hate us and wish to harm us by any means possible. Our intention is to obtain the necessary information to protect us from people with those intentions.
Remember, a captured terrorist always has the option of simply telling us what we want to know, and nothing else will be necessary.

It is because they are not in custody or physical control under a legal definition. They are volunteers who could quit at any time.

Nonsense! Once an individual has enlisted, he/she is certainly not free to “quit at any time.” Wherever did you learn to think, Counselor?

I see the anti-torture zealots are out in force, attempting to obfuscate the issue with their pseudo-legalese nonsense.

“torture” means an act committed by a person acting under the color of law specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control

The fact that this is done during interrogation is not a defense just because it is a specific intent crime.

Lioncourt, the fact that it is done during interrogation for the purpose of eliciting information and not for the purpose of torturing someone is precisely what makes it a specific intent crime.

You blew up your own argument before you even got going by posting the definition.

You saw the words right there before your eyes, yet failed to comprehend them.

Bullshit. It is because they are not in custody or physical control under a legal definition. They are volunteers who could quit at any time. It might not be good for their career, but they can quit. It has nothing to do with specific intent.

Bullshit indeed. There is no exception under the law for torture because the ‘victim’ volunteered for it.

You are just pulling this out of your ass.

So Lioncourt is now attempting to argue law with some people who actually have practiced it but can’t get his grammar right. The word should be confusing.

Big deal. I seem to be the only person who knows the difference between specific and general intent.

A great explanation of specific intent in the torture context, ironically, comes from Holder himself in the case of Demjanjuk v. Holder:

[T]orture is defined as “an extreme form of cruel and inhuman treatment and does not include lesser forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. . . . ” 8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(2). Moreover, as has been explained by the Third Circuit, CAT requires “a showing of specific intent before the Court can make a finding that a petitioner will be tortured.” Pierre v. Attorney General, 528 F.3d 180, 189 (3d Cir. 2008) (en banc); see 8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(5) (requiring that the act “be specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering”); Auguste v. Ridge, 395 F.3d 123, 139 (3d Cir. 2005) (“This is a ‘specific intent’ requirement and not a ‘general intent’ requirement” [citations omitted.] An applicant for CAT protection therefore must establish that “his prospective torturer will have the motive or purpose” to torture him. Pierre, 528 F.3d at 189; Auguste, 395 F.3d at 153-54 (“The mere fact that the Haitian authorities have knowledge that severe pain and suffering may result by placing detainees in these conditions does not support a finding that the Haitian authorities intend to inflict severe pain and suffering. The difference goes to the heart of the distinction between general and specific intent.”)

BTW, that wasn’t pseudo-legalese nonsense, it was the actual text of the federal statute on torture. Maybe you should look that up too. I certainly would have before making a post about it.

Ah, our soi dissant veteran and jd returns to spread ignorance…

The intent is information gathering. Infliction of pain is a byproduct. Any federal criminal court in the land is bound by that. Stop thinking civil law with its lower level of proof or should I say more correctly, convincing, Lioncourt. In the end, that is all that is about. Convincing a civil jury of ordinary people of XYZ. In criminal law, the standards are much different and much tighter.

Big tent.
Crimes Against Humanity