Political Scars

Photograph by Jonathan Hubschman

Cigarette burns. Ruptured ear-drums. A poorly healed bone fracture. Electrocution marks.

Those are some of the injuries Gary Stadtmauer, an internist, has seen in his New York office while volunteering for the Human Rights Clinic, a program that helps refugees win asylum in the United States by documenting torture and abuse.

The clinic has trained him to examine and interview the refugees to determine if their injuries derived from torture. When he can prove that a person has been brutalized, “we really save a life,” says Dr. Stadtmauer. “If someone is sent back to their country of origin, it’s likely they will be killed.”

The Human Rights Clinic is part of Doctors of the World-USA, a nonprofit organization in New York that provides medical and humanitarian aid overseas. The clinic has recruited and trained 180 physicians and mental-health workers. If the volunteers determine that a refugee’s description of abuse matches his or her physical or psychological trauma, they write a medical affidavit to bolster the case for asylum.

Refugees are referred to the charity by legal and human-rights organizations. About 700 people from more than 65 countries have sought help through the 10-year-old program, which has volunteers in Arizona, California, Colorado, and New York. More than 80 percent of participants have been granted asylum.

The Human Rights Clinic has a $400,000 budget, which comes from the federal government, foundations, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Here, a doctor examines the scars of a refugee from Pakistan.