Michael E. Dunlavey

Michael E. Dunlavey (born December 12, 1945)[1] is a former Major General in the United States Army.[2][3] Following his retirement from the Army he was elected a State Judge in Erie Pennsylvania.[4][5]

Michael E. Dunlavey
Born (1945-12-12) December 12, 1945
Buffalo, New York, United States
NationalityUnited States
OccupationGeneral officer, Judge
Known forA camp commandant at Guantanamo

Dunlavey is on record as requesting authorization for interrogators to use controversial interrogation techniques derived from reverse-engineering the SERE training special forces soldiers go through so they can withstand torture, when he was the camp commandant of the Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba.[6][7][8][9]

Dunlavey's speciality in the military was military intelligence, and it was in that capacity that he was appointed the commander of Joint Task Force 170, a position he held from February through November 2002. Dunlavey was the sole commander of JTF 170, a unit created to interrogate individuals held in Guantanamo Bay detention camp, in Cuba. Generals Lehnert and Baccus commanded Joint Task Force 160, a unit created to handle the detention of individuals held in Guantanamo. Dunlavey clashed with his Lehnert and Baccus, claiming they were undermining the efforts of his command through treating them humanely, allowing them to be visited by representatives of the Red Cross, and allowing them to be advised of their rights under the Geneva Conventions. He also clashed with the FBI, when its agents reported JTF 170 was using illegal interrogation techniques.[9] In October 2002 Dunlavey wrote a memo to his superiors, requesting formal authorization to use extended interrogation techniques, that included sleep deprivation, beatings, sensory deprivation and overload. In November 2002 Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld created Joint Task Force Guantanamo with the combined responsibilities of both Task Force 160 and Task Force 170, and appointed Geoffrey D. Miller to its command.


According to a September 11, 2011, profile in the Erie Times-News, a local paper, Dunlavey has defended the use of these controversial interrogation techniques.[4]

Dunlavey no longer discusses his involvement. In a previous interview with the Erie-Times News, he said that detainees at Guantanamo were "not prisoners of war the way we were trained for, or the (kind the) Geneva Convention envisions." However, he has said he believes the tactics developed for their interrogations were "consistent with the Geneva Convention."

In 2004 four United Kingdom citizens sued Dunlavey for his role in their detention.[10] In 2007 Freedom of Information Act requests revealed that Dunlavey told military investigators investigating the use of torture at Guantanamo that his orders came directly from Secretary of Defense Rumseld.[11][12]

In 2011 Dunlavey sent out an email joke, for which he felt he should apologize the next day.[13]

Dunlavey announced his intention to retire in May 2012, due to health problem.[14][15] Dunlavey had been undergoing treatment for after-effects of his service during the 1991 Gulf War since 2002, and had been diagnosed with cancer in the fall of 2011.

According to the Erie Times News Dunlavey had been an early advocate of establishing veterans courts.[15] The article compared special veteran's courts to mental health courts.

References
  1. "Erie County Annual Report 2010" (PDF). Erie Court of Common Pleas. Archived from the original (PDF) on 29 November 2015. Retrieved 21 January 2017.
  2. Bill Dedman (2006-10-26). "Can the '20th hijacker' of Sept. 11 stand trial?". NBC News. Retrieved 2012-09-26.
  3. "Maj. Gen. Michael E. Dunlavey appointed to Reserve Forces Policy Board". US Department of Defense. 1997-12-11. Archived from the original on 2010-03-01. Retrieved 2014-04-08. Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen has announced the designation of Maj. Gen. Michael E. Dunlavey as the Army Reserve member of the Reserve Forces Policy Board effective Dec. 1, 1997. Dunlavey currently serves as assistant deputy chief of staff for Intelligence (IMA), Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, Washington, D.C.
  4. Jim Martin (2011-09-11). "Individuals with Erie ties leave mark on post-9/11 era". Go Erie. Retrieved 2012-09-27. Erie County Judge Michael E. Dunlavey has also faced challenges to his reputation and questions about his judgment as a result of his service. That service began within days of the 2001 terrorist attacks when Dunlavey, a two-star general in the U.S. Army Reserve, was pressed into service to oversee global anti-terrorism operations.
  5. Pat Howard (2009-01-25). "Roles of 2 Erie soldiers serve as bookends in terrorism debate". Erie Times-News. Retrieved 2012-09-27. Dunlavey, a retired two-star general in the U.S. Army Reserve, was called up in the wake of 9/11. While serving at Guantanamo, he played a role in shaping what Vandeveld encountered years later.
  6. Douglas A. Pryer (2009). "The fight for the high ground: The U.S. Army and interrogation during Operation Iraqi Freedom I, May 2003 - April 2004" (PDF). U.S. Army Command and General Staff College. pp. 49, 55, 59, 204. Retrieved 2012-09-27. When finalized, the list of techniques drafted by these two scientists would serve as the basis of an October 11, 2002, memo sent from Major General Dunlavey to his superior, General James Hill, the commander of U.S. Southern Command. In this memo, Dunlavey explicitly requested approval for techniques that derived from "U.S. military interrogation resistance training" (SERE schools). Hill forwarded this documentation on October 25, 2002, to General Richard Myers, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, for approval. Media related to File:The fight for the high ground: The U.S. Army and interrogation during Operation Iraqi Freedom I, May 2003 - April 2004.pdf at Wikimedia Commons
  7. "Investigation into FBI Allegations of Detainee Abuse at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba Detention Facility" (PDF). Department of Defense. 2005. Retrieved 2012-09-27. Interrogation operations at GTMO began in January 2002. Initially interrogators relied upon the interrogation techniques contained in FM 34-52. These techniques were ineffective against detainees who had received interrogation resistance training. On 11 Oct 2002, Major General Michael E. Dunlavey, the Commander of Joint Task Force (JTF) 170, the intelligence task force at GTMO, requested that the CDR USSOUTHCOM, GEN James T. Hill, approve 19 counter resistance techniques that were not specifically listed in FM 34-52. Media related to File:Investigation into FBI Allegations of Detainee Abuse at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba Detention Facility.pdf at Wikimedia Commons
  8. Michael Haas (2009). George W. Bush, War Criminal?: The Bush Administration's Liability for 269 War Crimes. ABC-CLIO. p. 64. ISBN 9780313364990. Retrieved 2014-04-08. Major General Michael Dunlavey, commanding officer of the prison at Guantanamo, sent a memo on October 11, 2001, proposing four categories of techniques (Table 4.1). Whereas his memo appears to be a request to upgrade the harshness of interrogation, International lawyer Philippe Sands infers that he was pressured to author the document by those higher up the chain of command.
  9. Joseph Margulies (2007). Guantanamo and the Abuse of Presidential Power. Simon & Schuster. pp. 65–66, 68, 96–99, 134, 289, 330. ISBN 9780743286862. Retrieved 2014-04-08. Agents discussed the military's techniques "and how they were not effective or producing intel that was reliable." Agents repeatedly protested to Generals Dunlavey and Miller, but to no avail.
  10. Lisa Thompson (2004-10-29). "Dunlavey sued in torture: Ex-Guantanamo detainees blame Erie judge, Rumsfeld, 9 others". Erie Times-News. Retrieved 2014-04-08. The suit claims Dunlavey, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and nine other American military leaders were personally responsible for their torture. Dunlavey, a retired two-star general in the U.S. Army Reserve, oversaw interrogations at Naval Base Guantanamo Bay between March and November 2002.
  11. Lisa Thompson (2007-11-02). "Orders from the top". Erie Times-News. Archived from the original on 2014-04-09. Retrieved 2014-04-08. In a statement Dunlavey provided to a U.S. Air Force lieutenant general investigating FBI reports of detainee abuses at Guantanamo Bay, Dunlavey explains that as leader of interrogations at Guantanamo, he reported directly to President Bush and then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
  12. "SUMMARIZED WITNESS STATEMENT OF MG (RETIRED) MIKE DUNLAVEY" (PDF). Department of Defense. 2005. Retrieved 2014-02. Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  13. Lisa Thompson (2011-06-04). "Erie County judge apologizes for e-mail joke". Erie Times. Archived from the original on 2014-04-08. It read: "It was announced today that Buckwheat, of Our Gang fame, has converted to the Muslim faith and changed his name to Kareem of Wheat. I just hope he doesn't become a cereal killer."
  14. Emily Matson (2012-05-07). "Erie County Judge Michael Dunlavey Announces His Retirement". WSEE. Archived from the original on 2012-05-12. Retrieved 2014-04-08. He was diagnosed with cancer late last fall, and has been under treatment since 2002, for other medical issues, in connection with his military service in the Middle East.
  15. "Our View: Erie's veterans' court is right move". Go Erie. 2014-04-07. Archived from the original on 2014-04-08. Erie County Judge Michael E. Dunlavey advocated for a veterans' court before he retired in August 2012. A U.S. Army Vietnam War veteran, Dunlavey also helped to oversee interrogations of suspected terrorists at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba after 9/11.
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