Interior: Abuse Ruled Out in Prison Deaths (American Indian Prisons)

[maddezmom]

By JOHN HEILPRIN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Interior Department officials say they believe that several recent deaths in American Indian prisons are the result of natural causes and suicide, not alleged abuses and poor conditions that are the subject of an internal investigation.



Dave Anderson, head of the department's Bureau of Indian Affairs, dismissed a comparison between the allegations involving American Indian prisons under investigation by Interior's inspector general and the U.S. military's mistreatment of Iraqi detainees in the Abu Ghraib prison.


"I don't think there's any comparison at all," said Anderson, who said the number of deaths ranged up to fewer than a dozen.


"From what I understand, it's nothing out of the ordinary compared to what goes on in any other jail system," he said Friday in an interview with The Associated Press. "My understanding is that these are all either natural causes or attempted suicide. It isn't because of some type of abuse, from what I understand."

~snip~
more: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=718&e=6&u=/ap/20040522/ap_on_re_us/indian_prisons