Posted on 01/13/2008 5:07:09 AM PST by stan_sipple
At least 121 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans have committed a killing or been charged in one in the United States after returning from combat, The New York Times reported Sunday.
The newspaper said it also logged 349 homicides involving all active-duty military personnel and new veterans in the six years since military action began in Afghanistan, and later Iraq. That represents an 89-percent increase over the previous six-year period, the newspaper said.
About three-quarters of those homicides involved Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, the newspaper said. The report did not illuminate the exact relationship between those cases and the 121 killings also mentioned in the report.
The newspaper said its research involved searching local news reports, examining police, court and military records and interviewing defendants, their lawyers and families, victims' families and military and law enforcement officials.
Defense Department representatives did not immediately respond to a telephone message early Sunday. The Times said the military agency declined to comment, saying it could not reproduce the paper's research.
A military spokesman, Lt. Col. Les Melnyk, questioned the report's premise and research methods, the newspaper said. He said it aggregated crimes ranging from involuntary manslaughter to murder, and he suggested the apparent increase in homicides involving military personnel and veterans in the wartime period might reflect only "an increase in awareness of military service by reporters since 9/11."
Neither the Pentagon nor the federal Justice Department track such killings, generally prosecuted in state civilian courts, according to the Times.
The 121 killings ranged from shootings and stabbings to bathtub drownings and fatal car crashes resulting from drunken driving, the newspaper said. All but one of those implicated was male.
About a third of the victims were girlfriends or relatives, including a 2-year-old girl slain by her 20-year-old father while he was recovering from wounds sustained in Iraq.
A quarter of the victims were military personnel. One was stabbed and set afire by fellow soldiers a day after they all returned from Iraq.
In the NYT world
20 homicides/year from veterans=news
4000 homicides/year from illegals=not worth mentioning.
Imagine if they reported some study chronicling the number of killings in the same time period from Black or Hispanic gang members.
Instead they just keep fostering the tired old “trained killers released on society” nonsense from Viet Nam.
I also wonder how much their “study” relied on John ‘F’in Kerry’s 1971 ‘testimony?’
I imagine they are preparing for the new ‘winter soldier investigation’ being set up by the IVAW to further defame America’s heroes.
I don't have data to prove it, but if I were a betting man I would bet that there have been many more deliberate murders (as distinct from "killings" which may include accidental deaths, killing in self defense, etc) committed by Hispanic illegals in just the Atlanta metro area alone in that same time period than all the killings by war vets cited in the NYT article. If the number of accidental and justifiable killings caused by such things as drunk driving and self defense were added to the deliberate murders, the number of deaths caused in some way by illegals would probably more than double.
In any case I don't take anything the NYT says as fact unless it can be verified elsewhere. In recent years it's editorial section has become primarily a propaganda machine for enemies of the US, whoever that may be at any given time, and I don't put it past the paper to allow it's anti-American, anti-military editorial bias to seep over into it's gathering and reporting of actual news as well.
Nothing really new from Pinko/Liberals.
In 1937, I saw a movie "They Gave Him a Gun" starring Spencer Tracy and Franchot Tone. That movie was still beating on WWI as a generator of men who enjoyed killing.
I saw that story in the Slimes yesterday and it made me so angry I couldn’t even type.
Sounds like plenty of opportunity for episodes on CSI: Las Vegas.
The LTC spokesman for the pentagon could not “reproduce” the research. You mean he was not a part-time novelist?
This hit piece is just one more excellent example why the NY Slimes have been tagged The Slimes!
349? Hah! That's a drop in the bucket compared to the number of homicides committed by criminal aliens in the last six years.
also debunked with stats here: http://www.antimedia.us/posts/1200191106.shtml“What is so much incredibly worse about this story, however, is not the bias and not the predetermined outcome. It’s the blatant disregard for the facts, which fly in the face of this story and destroy the myth of US soldier as war-haunted homicidal maniac. From the October 1, 2001 start of the Afghanistan war, that’s about 26,000 troops/month. To date (Jan 2008) that would give about 1.99 million.
That means that the NY Times 121 murders represent about a 7.08/100,000 rate.
Now the numbers on deployed troops are probably high - fewer troops from 2001 - 2003; I’d love a better number if someone has it.
But for initial purposes, let’s call the rate 10/100,000, about 40% higher than the calculated one.
Now, how does that compare with the population as a whole?
Turning to the DoJ statistics, we see that the US offender rate for homicide in the 18 - 24 yo range is 26.5/100,000.For 25 - 34, it’s 13.5/100,000. In other words, the homicide rate for returning military personnel is dramatically lower — one-half to less than one-third as much as the general population. The entire thesis of the story is not only false but portrays the exact opposite of the truth!”
2 posted on 01/13/2008 9:52:04 AM CST by Dr. Bogus Pachysandra ("Don't touch that thing")
The Commiesphere is eating it up though
At the same time the dinosaur media try to suggest the war is turning gis into psycho killers, they also complain that the military recruiting standards are too high, keeping out the disadvantaged.
Meanwhile not a peep from the NYSlimes about how the Iraqi security forces are literally dis-assembling the al Qaeda networks. Tis per par.
It's like the sappy AP suicide among veterans story. Pure BS.
And that’s freeking scary isn’t it!!
They just say what they feel...thoughtlessly, carelessly and with complete ignorance.
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