November 2002: CIA Officer in Charge of Salt Pit Black Site Requests Guidance on Handling Detainees, Requests Are Ignored

CIA officer Matthew Zirbel, who is in charge of the Salt Pit prison in Afghanistan, asks for guidance on how he should manage the prison. However, the requests are largely ignored, apparently by his immediate boss, the CIA station chief in Afghanistan, known only as Paul P. Zirbel is a junior officer and has never run a prison before, which is presumably one of the reasons he makes the requests. Zirbel’s use of the water dousing method will later cause the death of a detainee (see November 20, 2002) and the CIA’s inspector general will find that the lack of guidance was a contributory factor leading up to the death. [Associated Press, 3/28/2010]