The fall of John Walker Lindh

The Green Berets woke Lindh up early the next morning, bound his arms and blindfolded him. A three-car convoy set out from Dostum's house back to Mazar-e-Sharif, where Lindh was taken to the main coalition base in the area, an unused high school where military officials interrogated him over the course of several days. He talked and talked, urged on by his interrogators who told him that anything he knew might be able to save American lives.

Some of the soldiers who had to deal with Lindh grew disgusted after learning where he had been and what he had done. His guards in particular began to show open disdain, along with traces of fear. They frequently called him "shit bag" and "terrorist," as well as "shithead" -- the nickname that stuck.

At some point during those initial days of questioning, which lasted from Dec. 2 to Dec. 7, it struck Lindh that he might need a lawyer, and he asked his military keepers when he could seek an attorney. But the officers on hand neither had an answer for him nor seemed overly concerned with Lindh's request. They wanted battlefield information that might be of use to the ongoing conflict, not evidence of criminal wrongdoing. Orders had come from the Pentagon that Lindh was to be questioned about military, not criminal, matters. The FBI, U.S. officials decided, would ask any questions about possible law violations later.

On Dec. 7, military officials planned to fly Lindh to Camp Rhino, the main U.S. base in Afghanistan outside Kandahar. In preparation for the journey, U.S. troops bound and blindfolded Lindh, tying his hands tightly together with plastic cuffs. On Lindh's blindfold U.S. troops scrawled "shithead," and they taunted him as they took turns posing for snapshots next to their infamous prisoner.

One soldier told Lindh he was "going to hang" for his crimes and that upon his death the soldier would sell the souvenir "shithead" blindfold snapshots and give the money to a Christian charity. Another soldier told Lindh that he'd like to shoot him then and there. But instead, they marched him from his quarters, shoved him into the back of a van, and drove him to the Mazar-e-Sharif airport. There, they hustled Lindh onto a cargo plane.

Onboard, the plastic cuffs dug into Lindh's wrists, sending sharp pains through his arms. At some point during the flight Lindh began to beg the unseen troops around him to loosen the ties, screaming to be heard over the engine noise of the plane. But Lindh's guards simply told him the cuffs weren't meant for comfort. And then Lindh began to grow scared.

"Please don't kill me," he pleaded, speaking blindly to the soldiers around him.

"Shut up," someone near said.

It was night when the plane touched down at Camp Rhino, about 70 miles south of Kandahar. Lindh's guards initially put him face down on a stretcher, and he thought for a moment that he might be en route to his execution. The frigid winter air in the high desert darkness swept cold over Lindh as the Marines unloaded him from the plane.

"Please don't kill me," Lindh begged again.

"Shut the fuck up," one of the Marines nearby said.

Lindh's guards cut off the clothes he had been given in Mazar-e-Sharif, leaving him naked as they bound him to a stretcher with duct tape wrapped tightly around his chest, upper arms and ankles. Troops at Camp Rhino took more pictures of Lindh as he lay naked, taped to the stretcher, blindfolded in pain and fear. Then they placed him in yet another metal shipping container, where Marines questioned him for roughly 45 minutes before leaving him to lay shivering alone, crying. After some time, guards returned to wrap him in blankets, but left him bound so tightly that his forearms were pinned together in front of him, pointing down. The Marines kept him like that for two days, inside his windowless compartment, unknowing of when day and night passed. Small holes in the sides of the container provided the only source of air and light, through which troops yelled swearing insults and loudly discussed how they planned to spit in his food. When Lindh needed to urinate, his guards simply propped up his stretcher vertically, leaving him bound.

Lindh began Dec. 9 cold and hungry. He was given a meal with pork, which he refused to eat. His guards then gave him another meal and a new blanket. Shortly thereafter, Marine guards entered Lindh's container, tore off the duct tape, dressed him in a hospital gown and shackles and then carried him on his stretcher, still blindfolded, to a nearby tent. When guards removed the blindfold, Lindh sat facing Federal Bureau of Investigation Agent Christopher Reimann, who introduced himself and then immediately read Lindh his rights. When Reimann came to the point related to one's right to an attorney, he said, "Of course, there are no lawyers here."

Reimann questioned Lindh in three lengthy interrogation sessions over the course of two days after Lindh waived his Miranda rights both verbally and in writing. After questioning, Lindh was allowed to wear clothes again and was no longer taped to furniture inside his box, but Reimann's interrogations were shaping up as something bad for Lindh nonetheless.

On Dec. 14, a helicopter flew Lindh from Camp Rhino to the USS Peleliu, a warship afloat about 15 miles off the coast of Pakistan, where he would remain for 17 days before being transferred to the USS Bataan. In mid-January of 2002, as Lindh sat jailed in the belly of a U.S. warship at sea, the government filed an affidavit and obtained an arrest warrant for him, clearing the way for a civilian trial in the United States. Last October, he was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison, after pleading guilty to aiding the Taliban and carrying explosives. With time off for good behavior, he will still need to serve 17 years.

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