Janis Leigh Karpinski is a central figure in the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse scandal.

Karpinski is currently a United States Army Colonel in the 800th Military Police Brigade. She was demoted from Brigadier General in the aftermath of the scandal, for dereliction of duty, making a material misrepresentation to investigators, and failure to obey a lawful order. She was the commander of three large US- and British-led prisons in Iraq in 2003, eight battalions, and 3400 Army reservists. Karpinski claims that she was made a "scapegoat" in order to protect higher ranking military personnel from the scandal.