FBI Doctor says the FBI doesnt torture people (but they do fly them off to other countries and have other countries question them under questionable condictions ... but they say trust us we NEVER torture people) nope those marks on his back are not whip scars they are acne scars. Original Article Monday, October 17, 2005 Last updated 4:47 p.m. PT Doctor disputes defendant's torture claims By MATTHEW BARAKAT ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- An FBI doctor testified Monday that he found no significant scars on the back of a U.S. citizen who claims that Saudi police whipped and tortured him into falsely confessing he joined al-Qaida and plotted to assassinate President Bush. Prosecutors allege Ahmed Omar Abu Ali joined al-Qaida in 2002 while enrolled in a college in Saudi Arabia. They say he confessed to plotting Bush's assassination along with other terrorist acts, including plans to establish an al-Qaida cell in the United States and to rescue of Muslim prisoners detained at Guantanamo Bay. Defense lawyers are scheduled to begin presenting their case Tuesday in the pretrial hearing at which U.S. District Judge Gerald Bruce Lee must decide whether Abu Ali's confession to the Saudis is admissible at trial. His attorneys want the confession thrown out. They argue that the 24-year-old falsely confessed after being tortured and whipped by the Saudis, and they say U.S. authorities were complicit in the torture. Prosecutors deny Abu Ali, of Falls Church, was mistreated. Richard Schwartz, a doctor contracted by the FBI, testified at a pretrial hearing that he examined Abu Ali in February, when he was brought to the U.S. from Saudi Arabia to face charges. Schwartz said he saw three or four lines of "increased pigmentation" on Abu Ali's upper back when he conducted his physical exam. The marks "appeared somewhat inconsequential," Schwartz said, and he did not include them in his written report. But he acknowledged on cross-examination that they could have been caused by a flogging. Schwartz said he specifically asked Abu Ali if he had been mistreated, and Abu Ali said no. Abu Ali, at his initial court appearance in the U.S. in February, told a magistrate that he had been tortured and offered to show the judge the scars on his back. Several of his previous lawyers also signed affidavits saying they had seen the scars. Abu Ali alleges that the torture occurred in the first few days after the Saudis arrested him in June 2003. Schwartz, the first American to examine him, did not do so until February 2005. A nurse at the Alexandria jail also testified Monday that she did not notice the scars when she examined him in February. Merry Brinkley said she noticed only a few pimples and acne scars. http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/1005/269590.html FBI Disputes Falls Church Man's Torture Claims Monday October 17, 2005 9:04pm Alexandria, Va. (AP) - An FBI doctor is disputing a Falls Church man's claim that Saudi police tortured him into saying he joined al-Qaida and plotted to assassinate President Bush. The doctor's testimony against 24-year-old Ahmed Omar Abu Ali came in a northern Virginia courtroom Monday. Abu Ali is accused of joining the terror organization in 2002, while a college student in Saudi Arabia. Abu Ali's lawyers are asking a federal judge to dismiss the government's prosecution, arguing he was whipped into giving the confession. They say U.S. officials acted in concert with the Saudis. But Richard Schwartz said he examined Abu Ali in February, when officials brought the man to the United States from Saudi Arabia to face charges. He said little more than acne scarring appeared on the Abu Ali's back and that Abu Ali told him he wasn't mistreated. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/17/AR2005101701873.html Doctor Testifies on Torture Issue Marks Were Observed on Student's Back but Cause Unclear By Jerry Markon Washington Post Staff Writer Tuesday, October 18, 2005; Page A16 A U.S. government doctor saw marks on the back of a Virginia student charged in a plot to kill President Bush but could not conclude that the lines came from physical abuse, the doctor testified at a hearing yesterday. The testimony is significant, because attorneys for Ahmed Omar Abu Ali claim that their client was tortured while in Saudi custody and that a confession that forms the crux of the government's case was coerced. Ahmed Omar Abu Ali is accused of plotting to kill President Bush. (AP) The four "linear marks" were seen on Abu Ali's upper back as he was flown to Northern Virginia in February to face charges of plotting with al Qaeda to kill Bush, according to the doctor, Richard Schwartz. Schwartz, chairman of emergency medicine at the Medical College of Georgia and an FBI contractor, examined Abu Ali during the flight. Under cross-examination from defense lawyers, Schwartz acknowledged that the marks could have been a result of whipping. Abu Ali's claim of torture is the subject of a hearing continuing this week in U.S. District Court in Alexandria. Schwartz also testified that the marks could have come from old scarring or could have been self-inflicted. "It's rather inconclusive what caused them. . . . Based on his history and physical, they did not seem consequential," he said. "I examine many, many patients every day, and I see marks like this on many people. It's one of those things that can occur in life." Schwartz added that he did not mention the marks in his two-page report -- which was based on his 10- to 15-minute exam -- and did not ask Abu Ali where they came from or tell anyone about them at the time. The doctor's testimony came on the third day of the hearing, which is examining whether Abu Ali's confession to taking part in the alleged al Qaeda plot was extracted through torture. Prosecutors deny that Abu Ali, 24, was tortured and have presented testimony from FBI agents and State Department officers who saw him in Saudi Arabia and said he never raised the subject with them and seemed healthy. Two other doctors who examined Abu Ali found evidence that he was tortured in Saudi Arabia and said scars on his back were consistent with his having been whipped, defense attorneys have said in court papers. If a judge accepts the defense arguments, he could throw out much of the government's evidence. The hearing began last week and is scheduled to last through Thursday. The defense's doctors are scheduled to testify later this week. Abu Ali is charged with conspiracy to assassinate Bush and other terrorism counts in connection with the alleged plot, which prosecutors say also envisioned a Sept. 11-style attack inside the United States. Prosecutors say that Abu Ali has admitted his participation and that he planned to shoot Bush or blow him up with a car bomb. He admitted that the plan never got past the idea stage, prosecutors have said in court papers. During the hearing last week, prosecutors introduced a 13-minute videotape in which Abu Ali said he joined the al Qaeda plot while in Saudi Arabia because of his disgust with U.S. support for Israel. Yesterday, FBI agent Barry Cole testified that when he interrogated Abu Ali in Saudi Arabia in September 2003, the Falls Church man said he had been subjected to "mental torture" but did not mention physical abuse. FBI agents followed up on the mental torture allegation, but Abu Ali refused to answer, Cole testified. "He just told us to forget about it," Cole said. "[He said] we wouldn't understand, because it was a Muslim thing.'