Welcome To “PRISONER EX WITH JOHN KIRKIAKOU”!
Our mission: turn people in prison (but who shouldn’t be) into ex-prisoners.
MEET JOHN
John Kiriakou knows from personal experience what it’s like to be imprisoned when you shouldn’t be. He was a CIA analyst and case officer from 1990 to 2004. In December 2007, John was the first former CIA officer to confirm that the CIA indeed waterboarded prisoners and had a torture program – approved at the highest levels of our government. As a result, Kiriakou spent eighteen months in federal prison – despite the fact that he never tortured anyone.
EPISODES
S1E1: ABU ZUBAYDAH
In the shadow of 9-11, America declared a war on terror and set out to capture Al Qaeda’s leadership. On March 28, 2002, Pakistani forces with CIA and FBI support captured the man they believed (at the time) was Al Qaeda’s Number Three: ABU ZUBAYDAH. Though Zubaydah provided plenty of solid, actionable intelligence, he wasn’t in fact Al Qaeda’s Number Three. However, despite knowing that fact – and despite the fact that Abu Zubaydah had consistently cooperated with his questioners – the CIA (with Vice President Dick Cheney’s full approval) – waterboarded Abu Zubaydah 83 times. Now housed at the high security area of Guantanamo Bay’s Military Prison, Abu Zubaydah faces an uncertain future. The US government has vowed it will never release him. That he will die a prisoner. But, that doesn’t have to be. And our audience can in deed and in fact make a real difference in what happens to Abu Zubaydah.
S1E2: DONALD REYNOLDS, JR.
Donald Reynolds, Jr was an ambitious young, Black businessman engaged in the music business, buying and selling old cars and buying and selling old weapons. In fact, Donny Reynolds applied for and got a three-stamp federal gun permit that allowed him to have silenced machine guns. To receive and keep that permit, Reynolds had to pass a stringent background check. Donny’s father – Donald Reynolds Sr – worked for America’s Oak Ridge National Labortory for 40 years (and had a security clearance). But, the Department Of Justice along with the Knoxville Police Department raided both father and son’s houses – convinced that Donny, Jr was a drug lord selling weapons to Mexican drug cartels. It wasn’t true. At all. What actually happened was that Donny Jr got swept up into a corrupt operation gone wrong – now called “Fast & Furious” – and he was suddenly being prosecuted as its key fall guy.
Coming soon
