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CIA Considered Using ‘Truth Serum’ Drug on Terror Suspects After 9/11

According to a previously classified report, the agency did not end up employing the method.

The CIA considered using a drug it believed could function as a “truth serum” on detained terror suspects after 9/11, the Associated Press reports. According to a 90-page CIA report released Tuesday to the ACLU, the agency concluded a drug called Versed was “possibly worth a try” after some research but did not end up employing the method. The drug research program, called “Project Medication,” reportedly went through records of “Soviet drug experiments” and the CIA’s MK-Ultra program—which exposed human subjects to LSD and other mind-altering substances in the 1950s and 1960s. The CIA then reportedly settled on Versed, a drug now commonly sold as a generic that “causes drowsiness and relieves anxiety and agitation.” However, the report states the agency declined to bring forward “drug-assisted interrogations” for Justice Department approval to spare CIA doctors “some significant ethical concerns.” The report also reveals the CIA’s detention and interrogation program included “doctors, psychologists, physician assistants and nurses” who evaluated and cared for “97 detainees in 10 secret CIA facilities abroad” between 2002 and 2007.