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Posted on 11/16/2004, 11:18:52 AM by ovrtaxt
NEW YORK (AP) - A U.S. Marine shot and killed a wounded and apparently unarmed Iraqi prisoner in a mosque in the former insurgent stronghold of Fallujah, according to dramatic pool television pictures broadcast Monday. A Marine spokesman in Washington said the shooting was under investigation.
The shooting Saturday was videotaped by pool correspondent Kevin Sites of NBC television, who said three other previously wounded prisoners in the mosque apparently also had been shot again by the Marines inside the mosque.
The incident played out as the Marines 3rd Battalion, 1st Regiment, returned to the unidentified Fallujah mosque Saturday. Sites was embedded with the unit.
Sites reported that a different Marine unit had come under fire from the mosque on Friday. Those Marines stormed the building, killing ten men and wounding five others, Sites said. The Marines said the fighters in the mosque had been armed with rocket-propelled grenades and AK-47 rifles.
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On the video as the camera moved into the mosque during the Saturday incident, a Marine can be heard shouting obscenities in the background, yelling that one of the men was only pretending to be dead.
The video then showed a Marine raising his rifle toward a prisoner laying on the floor of the mosque but neither NBC nor CNN showed the bullet hitting the man. At that moment the video was blacked out but the report of the rifle could be heard.
The blacked out portion of the video tape, provided later to Associated Press Television News and other members of the network pool, showed the bullet striking the man in the upper body, possibly the head. His blood splatters on the wall behind him and his body goes limp.
Sites reported a Marine in the same unit had been killed just a day earlier when he tended to the booby-trapped dead body of an insurgent.
The events on the videotape began as some of the Marines from the unit accompanied by Sites approached the mosque on Saturday, a day after it was stormed by other Marines.
Gunfire can be heard from inside the mosque, and at its entrance, Marines who were already in the building emerge. They are asked by an approaching Marine lieutenant if there were insurgents inside and if the Marines had shot any of them. A Marine can be heard responding affirmatively. The lieutenant then asks if they were armed and fellow Marine shrugs.
Sites' account said the wounded men, who he said were prisoners and who were hurt in the previous day's attack, had been shot again by the Marines on the Saturday visit.
The videotape showed two of the wounded men propped against the wall and Sites said they were bleeding to death. According his report, a third wounded man appeared already dead, while a fourth was severely wounded but breathing. The fifth was covered by a blanket but did not appear to have been shot again after the Marines returned. It was the fourth man who was shown being shot.
A spokesman at Marine Corps headquarters in the Pentagon, Maj. Doug Powell, said the incident was "being investigated." He had no further details, other than to confirm the incident happened on Saturday and that the Marines involved were part of the 1st Marine Division.
The CNN broadcast of the pictures used pixilation to cover parts of the video that could lead to public identification of the Marines involved.
NBC's Robert Padavick told members of the U.S. television pool that the Pentagon had ordered NBC and other pool members to make sure the Marines identity was hidden because "they (the military authorities) are anticipating a criminal investigation as a result of this incident and do not want to implicate anybody ahead of that."
In New York, NBC spokeswoman Allison Gollust said the network did not broadcast the prisoner being shot because of the "graphic nature" of the video.
This explains a lot. I don't have a problem with it.
Five bucks says this poor G.I.'s name -- first, last, middle initial -- is all over the MSM airwaves within the next seventy-two hours... outside.
HOW LONG. how long do we put up with a media that is dead set on creating failure in Iraq? HOW LONG?
Mr. Sites should be required to check out every dead and wounded terrorist for the Marines. What does he think he is, a referee? Has he written/videotaped any stories about terrorists pretending to surrender and then shooting at Marines? ...or about wounded terrorists trying to kill Marines? ...or about Marines killed by booby trapped wounded or dead terrorists? This scumbag is just trying to make a name for himself. I hope the Marines he's embedded with leave him a little less protected in the future.
God bless our armed forces.
And his hometown...
Until average people get PO'd enough to do something about it. When a crown shows up outside the NBC building, and the Naval Department, demanding that the media lynch mob be ignored, we may see some things change. These bastards are endangering our Marines with their psychological warfare.
Give this marine a medal other than the purple heart then. Well done.
Man, that's brilliant!
Mr. Sites out to "watch his back"....
Betray a Marine isn't a good thing.
In WW II, the combat reporter would have voluntarily burned the film in front of the squad of Marines...
How many GI's lost their lives in wars to booby trapped bodies? The liberal press needs to be stopped at the Kuwait border and denied entry. Let these guys get on with the dirty business of war.
It wouldn't bother ME if our troops started shooting at MSM reporters!
Imus brought up that these Marines were not the ones who left the wounded ones there ..and Charles Sabine finally brought out all the dangers to the Marines of booby trapped bodies and feined death or wounded..Of course Imus is anti war..but at least he straightened out one misconception.
Also pointing out the Marine had been shot in the face the day before..This is why I put up with Imus some days.
This is the ONLY semi fair presentation I have seen and Imus says "tell Kevin Sikes to butt out"
AMEN!! I Pray for them daily. I cant even imagine the tremendous pressure these men and women are under day-to-day.
Maybe its time to stop the embeded media from following them??
No better friend; no worse enemy. Sites has been looking to make his Seymore Hersh bones since he got there. They need to send him back to the States.
Kevin Sites
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