The following is the statement by US Navy lawyer Wayne Wright detailing his experience on Nov 16, 2006.

1. I arrived in Kuala Lumpur about 3pm on Thursday, Nov 16, 2006, checked into my hotel, the Swiss Inn and went around town for a while.

2. Around 8-9 pm, I was walking in Chinatown no more than a block away from my hotel and a man in civilian clothes with no obvious identification that would make a reasonable person believe him to be police walked up to me and asked me where I was from. I responded the US and moved away from him because I saw no need to talk with him further.

3. He next asked either "can I see your passport" or "do you have a passport". I don't exactly remember which, but again I felt no need to talk with him and said "no" and moved away from him further.

4. He then came after me calling one or two other civilian clothes persons with no ID to put me in handcuffs. Still I had no idea who they were.

5. I started yelling at the top of my voice that I was an American and that someone in the crowd should call the US Embassy. I yelled to the crowd at least 10 times.

6. They dragged me away, one in front by the cuffs and one in back by my pants.

7. About a block or so from where I was stopped and put in handcuffs, I started feeling sharp pain and numbness down my right hand in particular to my index finger. I asked the person to please loosen the cuffs and stop dragging me by them but he would not. He just kept telling me to shut up and that he was taking me to his "boss". He indicated that I was attempting to run from him and that was the reason for such harsh treatment.

8. At that point, I still didn't know who he was or that he was with the police, I seriously thought he was about to rob me.

9. After we walked a few more blocks we got to a gated bus where lots of people were standing, and the guys took me to a person who asked me where my documents were. I told him that they were either in my pocket or in my room. I was still cuffed so they patted me down and felt no documents so they put me in the truck and took the cuffs off.

10. Immediately when I was in the truck my hands felt very hot and sensitive to the touch and numb at the same time... kind of like when they fall asleep for a long while.

11. After several minutes I realised that I have a colour copy of my passports in my wallet and asked to show them to the people, but no one was interested in listening to me at that point.

12. The bus of people were all males of black colour. There were two African-Americans in the bus; me and one other. We essentially all looked about the same.

13. Someone mentioned that Africans were running some kind of scam or cartel in the area and that was why we were most likely targeted.

14. The bus was moved to another location where it appeared to me and others that the police gathered and went off to dinner. We waited more than an hour.

15. The bus went to another location where individuals on my bus were taken off the bus and catalogued. I gave my copy of my passport to the individuals in charge, and they said they would check it out. I got on the other bus.

16. We waited there for about another hour or two and moved to the immigration holding pen.

16. Once in the immigration holding pen, we were told to wait until morning. This was about 1-2am.

17. Once morning arrived, I attempted to convince the guards to allow us to make a phone call to the embassy or somewhere for help. We were told that we were going to be catalogued in and moved to the cell blocks and then we would be able to make a call. They said it normally takes a few days for the immigration officers to do a background investigation to determine your identity.

18. I was moved to cell block B where I repeatedly asked to make a call to no avail. The trustee essentially said that I might be able to make a call on Monday. I thought this to be outrageous. Later he told me to put my name and request in a book and that my requests would be considered later.

19. All throughout the ordeal, I made sure that people knew that I was an American and that I would like to call the embassy.

20. This morning my hands are still numb, particularly my two thumbs, my right pointer finger and the space between the thumb and pointer are still numb and I fear that I have permanent damage done to my hands. I will seek medical evaluation once back in the US.

21. After I talked with you, about 4pm, they let us go to immigration. There at immigration I found a copy of my passport. They didn't appear that they were working with that document to release me.

22. As I stated yesterday, my goal now is to make sure that no other American has to deal with this in Malaysia, particularly African-Americans who are obviously targets in KL. Again I am a lawyer for the Navy GS14, and I don't like being treated in such a way.