Haditha: Tale of Three Cities (Update From Marine's Mother)

The news coverage of yesterday’s Article 32 hearing at Camp Pendleton of Marine Lance Corporal Justin Sharratt exhibits the different treatment of facts between the New York Times, San Diego’s Union-Tribune and North County Times, and in Haditha.

Sharratt’s grand jury-type hearing is the first of the enlisted men charged with murder in the killings at Haditha on November 19, 2005.

The New York Times’ report, dateline Camp Pendleton (meaning its reporter was there), is headlined “U.S. Inquiry Hampered by Iraq Violence, Investigators Say.” The entire content is about the dangerous conditions in Haditha when Naval investigators tried to get testimony from locals, a theme in line with the New York Times’ emphasis on hopeless violence in Iraq. One of the investigators said,

Because of time and security concerns, she said, she had interviewed six family members at once, gathering testimony that would form the case against Corporal Sharratt.

James D. Culp, a civilian lawyer defending Corporal Sharratt, suggested that group interviews had been “contradictory to everything you have been taught.” Ms. Mannle said she did not have time to conduct separate interviews or review her notes before the marines said it was time to leave.

She did not record the interview, she said, because she could not find a recorder, but when pressed by Mr. Culp, she said she never sought to buy one from the post exchange.

An N.C.I.S. spokesman, Ed Buice, said in an e-mail message that no federal law enforcement agency regularly taped interviews.

The New York Times report had no comment about the inability to check locals’ stories against each other, a common practice.

The North County Times, near Camp Pendleton, adds vital information from the hearing that the New York Times didn’t find fit to print.

A lance corporal charged with murder in the shooting deaths of three Iraqi brothers in 2005 passed a polygraph examination in which he said the first man he shot was holding an AK-47 assault rifle, according to testimony heard in a base courtroom Tuesday.

The test, administered in Iraq in April 2006, showed there was no apparent deception in an account provided by Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt, Naval Criminal Investigative Service Special Agent Nayda Mannle testified.

Sharratt's attorneys strived Tuesday to show inconsistencies in the government's investigation, focusing many of their questions on why agents did not pursue full background reports on the men who died inside the fourth home, particularly one man who worked on the Jordanian border and may have had several Jordanian passports in his possession.

Mannle, who is a civilian agent, said such checks probably should have been done and agreed that agents can still try to piece that information together. But she also said that none of the 24 victims who died in Haditha had any known ties to the insurgency.

"We ran them through the database and all came up as negative for insurgents," she said during telephonic testimony from an office in the Pentagon.

The defense also is trying to show that forensic evidence from where the Iraqi men died is inconsistent with an account given by their surviving family members, who told investigators the men were herded into a room and executed in rapid succession. Sharratt has disputed that account.

Instead, the forensics from the government investigation show that one of the slain men was apparently hiding inside a closet and bullet holes are scattered on a wall throughout that room. The defense contends that dispels the allegation of an execution-style slaying.

The San Diego Union-Tribune’s coverage described the Naval investigator’s acceptance of the colluded stories of Haditha family members over that of the Marines.

The San Diego Union-Tribune, also, managed to cover testimony that the New York Times didn’t see worthy of print:

Sharratt's attorneys hammered at what they viewed as omissions and shortcomings by the naval investigators. During cross-examination, Mannle acknowledged that Sharratt had passed a polygraph exam concerning whether any of the Ahmed brothers pointed a rifle at him.

She also said time constraints prompted by the extreme danger to foreigners in Haditha prevented her from separating the Ahmed family members before questioning them, which is standard procedure in crime investigations.

In addition, Mannle confirmed that Marines seized several AK-47 rifles and a suitcase allegedly containing Jordanian passports from the Ahmed compound the day of the killings. She said her agency wasn't able to track down these items, which might have linked the Ahmed brothers to insurgent activity.

Neither the New York nor San Diego reporting on Haditha mentions the dramatic change in Haditha since the “surge.” I recalled a May 2007 report in the Los Angeles Times, which failed to show up in a Google search “Haditha.” After some additional searching, I did find a single reference to it in a Seattle Times reprint:

HADITHA, Iraq -- The weather was desert hot. But the Pepsi was nicely cold. After acting the role of the gracious host, the mayor here made his point. "The people of Germany and Japan would not have made progress without the Americans," Mayor Abdul Hakim M. Rasheed told the U.S. Marine officers who recently came to his heavily guarded home. "The people of Iraq deserve the same."

The Marines, including three generals, assured Rasheed that they had no plans to abandon him and his city. Don't be distracted by the political debate in Washington, they urged Rasheed, who listened and nodded….

Marine commanders say their success in reducing insurgent violence in Haditha and other areas of al-Anbar is an indication that a "surge" of troops, like that being tried by the Army in Baghdad, can succeed. But they note that a surge is a beginning, not an end.

Rasheed indicated that he remains concerned that the Americans, in their haste to leave, might leave behind a City Council whose members are insurgents in disguise, waiting for the U.S. to depart.

Note, at another Article 32 hearing last week of Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani, distinguished battalion commander of the force in Haditha, charged with failing to report upwards all he knew of the events of that day, much was made of the testimony of Maj. Gen. Richard Huck that,

[Huck] didn’t become aware until this week that the Haditha town council met with Chessani eight days after the killings and presented a formal letter, written in English, contending a war crime had been committed….If that document was presented, (that) needs to be reported and the commander should be thinking ‘Perhaps I should get an investigation started,’ “ Huck said.

Quick, stop the war, a known treacherous Haditha town council should be taken more seriously than all Americans at the scene of an enemy attack, and in the midst of heavy ongoing fighting in Anbar during November 2005 the on-scene commander should place his priorities elsewhere, and his Marines should fail to adequately defend themselves!

Oh, the only other recent item on improved conditions in Haditha that I found in my Google search was in local coverage in Alaska’s Kodiak Daily Mirror: Marine Lance Cpl. Bryan Gilbert graduated from Kodiak High School in 2005 and shortly after joined the U.S. Marine Corps.

Gilbert went to Haditha, Iraq. Haditha is where a lot of bloodshed has taken place, but it is now more stabilized.

It was in Haditha just before Gilbert arrived that Marines were killed by an IED, and later both enemy and civilians were killed in an onslaught that resulted in controversy and charges over the action.

This was also where insurgents gathered members of the Iraqi police, took them to a soccer field and shot them.

“There are Marines still there. We established order. Now there is a small-town government, an elected mayor and the Iraqi police are in force,” Gilbert said.

“The last two months there, not a single shot was fired at us. Haditha is stable today."

Thank you so much for this article. It is the best depiction of the insanity of the NCIS. It is a complete moral and intellectual outrage that these young heroes are being treated as terrorists. My son was in the same battalion when this incident happened and has returned to Iraq on a second deployment while his brother Marines face this. I cannot tell you the affect that this is having on them and how many lives may be lost as they have now to add to their contemplation if they will face arrest upon their return. I would rather have my son in a jail cell than a pine box.

Anbar has gone from an average of 37 attacks per day to less than one. Baghdad is largely under control. The enemy is pressing for a ceasefire. The America-hating, loser-wannabe liberals are in a panic that we might win this war before they have a chance to undermine it completely.

Google up the investigator’s name and it comes up that she ran in a half marathon in Hawaii. I’m thinking she’s a thrill seeker Clinton appointee who doesn't play by the rules all that well.

"The people of Germany and Japan would not have made progress without the Americans," Mayor Abdul Hakim M. Rasheed told the U.S. Marine officers who recently came to his heavily guarded home. "The people of Iraq deserve the same."

The Marines, including three generals, assured Rasheed that they had no plans to abandon him and his city. Don't be distracted by the political debate in Washington, they urged Rasheed, who listened and nodded….

Rasheed indicated that he remains concerned that the Americans, in their haste to leave, might leave behind a City Council whose members are insurgents in disguise, waiting for the U.S. to depart.

I sincerely hope that there is someone planning to take out NCIS. I don't see anything left there that is redeemable or remedial.

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