Shortly After November 20, 2002: CIA Sends Team to Investigate Detainee Death at Salt Pit Black Site

After learning that detainee Gul Rahman has died at the CIA’s Salt Pit black site in Afghanistan (see November 20, 2002), the agency’s headquarters sends a team to investigate what has happened. [Associated Press, 3/28/2010] The team is dispatched by the CIA’s Deputy Director for Operations, Jim Pavitt. [Central Intelligence Agency, 5/7/2004, pp. 1 ] According to a CIA official, “The guidance [from headquarters] was for the people on scene to preserve everything as it was.” After the death, a medic at the site found that Rahman had died of hypothermia, and this is later confirmed by another doctor. Presumably, this later doctor is part of the team sent out now. [Associated Press, 3/28/2010; Harper's, 3/28/2010]