The more I learn about the allegations of prisoner abuse in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison, the more I think about Richard Ricci.
Richard Ricci, you'll recall, was perhaps the most famous non-suspect suspect in Salt Lake Police Department history two years ago this summer when he became entangled in the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping mystery.
Officially, the career con man and thief, who spent three-fourths of his adult life behind bars, was never a "suspect" in the police's strict definition of that word. That's because there wasn't a shred of physical evidence to suggest Ricci was the kidnapper. There was, however, plenty of circumstantial evidence, starting with the fact that Ricci worked construction for Ed Smart, Elizabeth's father, at the Smart home, that items stolen from the home were found later at Ricci's residence, that Ricci was implicated in other burglaries when people were sleeping, and that an auto mechanic said Ricci took his car from the repair lot and put on a thousand unexplained miles the week of the kidnapping.
Despite Ricci's steadfast denials that he was a kidnapper, or that he took his car from the repair lot, and despite the lack of physical evidence that he did, the police were so convinced he had something to hide that they hauled him off to state prison, on burglary charges, and locked him in a cell next to death row.
According to various sources, including Ricci's wife, Angela (who has filed a lawsuit against, among others, the Department of Corrections), prison authorities limited his time outside the cell to an hour a day, he was denied hot showers, hot meals, shaving privileges and outside contact with other inmates and members of his own family.
The idea was to make Ricci crack, and after two months he did crack — when he died of a brain hemorrhage.
At Abu Ghraib, the circumstances we're hearing are different, but the story is the same: prisoners being pressured because their captors "know" they know more than they're telling.
Take the inmates to the cracking point, and learn all their secrets.
In postwar Iraq, the justifications for such abusive treatment are many, summed up by the party line that the more evidence that can be found about terrorism and the horrors of Saddam Hussein's toppled regime, the better.
Just as the party line for sweating Richard Ricci was because the more that could be found out about a kidnapping that was terrorizing the community the better.
But too often, justification is the evil clone of justice. Watch out, or "feeling justified" only results in abuse begetting more abuse. History is fraught with examples. In World War II, Japan ignored the Geneva Convention rules regarding prisoners of war and routinely abused hundreds of thousands of incarcerated Allied prisoners, all because the Japanese felt they were justified.
Those same rumblings are now coming out of Iraq: that the standards set by the Geneva Convention don't, or certainly shouldn't, apply to terrorists — or suspected terrorists — so, therefore, let the humiliation begin.
Almost two years ago now, a similar mind-set seemed to prevail in regard to one Richard Albert Ricci: the standard rules of incarceration don't, or certainly shouldn't, apply to kid-stealers — whether they're official suspects or not — so, therefore, let the solitary confinement begin.
And seven months after he's dead, wake up one day to the news that Elizabeth Smart has been found alive and in the company of others — and they sure aren't Richard Ricci.
Lee Benson's column runs Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Please send e-mail to benson@desnews.com and faxes to 801-237-2527.