Jury acquits Marine of murder

NCTimes.com ^ | 1 August, 2007 | TERI FIGUEROA staff writer

[brityank]

PING.

[elhombrelibre]

An innocent man was killed, but it says a great deal about the standards of our military that an investigation was initiated and due process has been followed for those who conspired or took his life.

[Girlene]

Just posted the same article from North County Times here http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1874940/posts

I like your title better, brityank. I’ll stick with this thread. Awesome news for Magincalda. It could have been much worse. We’ll see what the sentencing phase brings up. He still faces some possible harsh penalties.

[brityank]

I question your supposition of him being "an innocent man". There have been many details exposed that indicated that the town was awash in insurgents and their supporters, and the Marines were under constant attack and harassment.

You want cops, send in the Blue Helmets. You engage in war -- fight it like one.

[Girlene]

An innocent man was killed,...

The problem with this case is neither the Marines, NCIS, nor the prosecution knows who was killed. He may be a suspected insurgent. Only when the cases went to trial was it found out the prosecution can't identify the Iraqi who was killed as an "innocent" man.

[elhombrelibre]

Thanks. I didn’t know that, and it’s a very important point.

[elhombrelibre]

You’ve more background than I. I’ll defer to you on this.

[taxesareforever]

You want cops, send in the Blue Helmets. You engage in war -- fight it like one.

Exactly. Besides, the blue helmets never get tried for their crimes.

[RedRover]

Ping!

[jazusamo]

I hope he gets no additional jail time. Thanks for the ping, Red.

[FlingWingFlyer]

"Charging a man with murder in this place was like handing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500" -- Capt. Willard

War is heck!

[skeeter]

This afternoon ABC News headline news went something like 'Marine Guilty of Conspiracy to Commit Murder'.

But barely a mention of the not guilty on the main charge.

Its why I hate 'em.

[RedRover]

He still faces some possible harsh penalties.

Hope the sentences matches Cpl Thomas'. If not (if I understand the system correctly) Gen Mattis can reduce the sentence (but not increase it).

If both receive light sentences, and both stand, I hope Gen Mattis will do the right thing and commute LCpl Pennington's sentence to time served. Seems that not fighting the charges in court was a mistake.

[RedRover]

BTW, brityank, I love your posting style!

[brityank]

Thanks; Cut and Paste makes it easy.         :^)

[Hot Tabasco]

An innocent man was killed,

Thats all we need to hear especially if it was determined to be premidated......

You want cops,

No, nor do we want indiscriminate executioners.......

The military has served its justice.

[xzins]

An innocent man was killed,

The Marines believed he was an insurgent. I trust their battlefield judgement more than that of arm chair 2d guessers back in the states.

The man was not innocent. Otherwise, there's no way that Magic's teammate could have been sentenced to just the BCD Special. After all, he was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder.

[brityank]

The military has served its justice.

Others can probably chime in with better info than I, but this was a political trial. Look up the rest of the threads on this.

I was under the UCMJ, and would far rather be there than under the civil system -- that is political which is why it's not called the Victim's Justice System!

[Girlene]

Yes, Lt. Gen. Mattis has leeway to reduce the sentences. It will be interesting to see what sentencing is handed out from the jury pool. They began their deliberation today. I imagine Magincalda got out of the murder charge, also, because nobody claimed he actually shot at the Iraqi. It had to have made the decision for this jury much easier to acquit him of the murder charge vs. Cpl. Thomas.