Agent accused of prisoner abuse has violence history
A CIA contractor, charged with fatally assaulting an Afghan prisoner, was fired from a police force after an assault 14 years ago and a history of run-ins with wives and neighbours, authorities and acquaintances said today.
David Passaro, aged 38, has been accused of assault and assault with a dangerous weapon – a torch – following the death of Abdul Wali last June.
Wali had gone to a US base in Afghanistan on his own accord that month and surrendered to authorities.
They suspected him of participating in rocket attacks against the base and wanted to talk to him.
Three days after he surrendered, he was dead, and authorities accuse Passaro of beating him.
Passaro was not charged with murder because no autopsy was performed to establish a cause of death, Justice Department officials said.
It is the first time civilian charges have been brought in the investigation of prisoner abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan.
US Attorney General John Ashcroft said the indictment sends a message that “the United States will not tolerate criminal acts of brutality” against detainees.
People who know him say Passaro has a history of aggressive behaviour.
Nancy Mulroy, a spokeswoman for the Hartford Police Department in Connecticut, said Passaro graduated in 1990 from the city’s police academy but was relieved of duty after he was arrested by state police before completing his probationary period.
Though arrested on assault charges in the case, he was convicted in July 1991 of breach of peace, state police said.
Passaro’s ex-wife, Kerry Passaro, said her husband had assaulted a neighbour.
“He was violent toward me throughout the marriage,” she told North Carolina television stations.
North Carolina records show David and Kerry Passaro were divorced in February 2001, and that Passaro remarried in March 2002.
Since he remarried, Harnett County deputy sheriffs had been called to the rural house twice to investigate domestic fights and again to look into a complaint that Passaro fired a gun at a neighbour’s dog.
If convicted, Passaro faces up to 40 years in prison. He was ordered to be held without bail after an initial appearance before a magistrate in Raleigh, North Carolina.
A former Green Beret medic and US army ranger, Passaro began his contract with the CIA in December 2002.
He arrived at the Afghan base in mid-May 2003, a few weeks before the alleged abuse occurred, US officials said.
