Marine's Iraq killings trial to go forward

AP ^ | March 26, 2010 | Elliot Spagat

[jazusamo]

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. — A military judge in California has denied a motion to dismiss charges against a Marine sergeant whose squad killed 24 Iraqi men, women and children after a bomb killed a Marine.

Lt. Col. David Jones ruled Friday at Camp Pendleton on a defense motion claiming there was unlawful command influence while a general considered a court-martial for Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich.

The judge ruled there was no record of any "meaningful comment" between the general and an aide who had investigated the case as a military lawyer.

Wuterich is facing trial on reduced charges of voluntary manslaughter and other crimes in the November 2005 attack in the town of Haditha.

[Gene Eric]

Disappointing.

[stylin19a]

I feel your anger. I’m not quibbling...just minorly correcting your rant.
Sec. Nav ordered the letters of censure, otherwise, those 3 would have gotten off.

No Marine should have been been investigated in this matter.
The General Staff and Murtha bought Tim McGIRK’s fantasy.

And I agree....Marines are suppose to cover another Marines ass.
Where’s Chesty when you need him ?

Semper Fi.

[A.A. Cunningham]

LET ALL THE OFFICERS OFF

Chessani would probably argue with your broad, simplistic generalization.

[Marine_Uncle]

I as so many here feel very bad for the Sarg., as well as all his Marines that where caught up in this total fiasco. Damn it all.

[RaceBannon]

So would Lt Phan....

[jazusamo]

An additional article by Tony Perry.

Marine to face court-martial in killings of 24 Iraqi civilians

[Saoirise]

PERSECUTION PERSECUTION PERSECUTION

P E R S E C U T I O N!

[4woodenboats]

I sent this to ABC;

I see you get your scoops from other headlines, rather than do your own DD.

A couple of pertinent facts amongst dozens; The 1st investigation was by the Army, and it was called the Watts Investigation.

It cleared the 3/1 from any wrongdoing.

However, SecNav Winter had already jerked his knee and destroyed the carreers of senior officers over the matter, Murtha was conducting a Murdering Marine telethon from his trough that feeds the Navy, so another investigation was "set up", the Bargewell report.

Col Ewers was a principal in that report, and at the same time he made a film condeming the 3/1's actions shortly after the investigation begun.

I watched it on TV as did millions of people worldwide.

Concurrent with these actions, Col Ewers was General Mattis's senior advisor on Haditha, the Bargewell investigation, etc.

The judge in Lt. Col Chessani's trial called foul for the obvious Unlawful Command Influence Ewers had on Mattis (Who, BTW, received his 4th star immediately upon "his" decision to railroad the 3/1.

This is one of the most documented military prosecutions in history, and likely the most influential on our military's moral.

If you and that barrel of ink you're sitting on can't do any better than this, see if you can get yourself assigned to M.O.'s fashion detail and stop wasting our time.

[jazusamo]

Thank you for sending that to ABC, boats.

I read their hit piece on this and wouldn’t even link it in this thread, they’re despicable.

You have a good grasp of what has taken place. So much has transpired over the last four plus years it’s difficult for me to remember without going back and reading the many articles written.

Thanks again!

[Saoirise]

Today was all about CYA (Covering Ewers, Riggs, Mattis and Hellend’s a$$e$) and throwing Frank Wuterich, the enlisted guy to the wolves.

Frank Wuterich, a leader who was caught in a hellhole firefight during a city wide planned attack by the insurgency in Haditha and still miraculously brought all but one of his men home alive.

Here's what Judge Jones said this afternoon starting at 1:00 pm: “Denied” and then 39 mins & 59 seconds of blah blah blah, CTA (covering their a$$e$) blah blah, Riggs and Ewers have big enough egos not to cow tow to influence, blah blah blah, Mattis and Hellend weren't impacted by Ewers siting in on every meeting (even though he conducted investigations with the Bargewell investigation to implicate the Marines) and now everyone is supposed to believe Ewers had NO IMPACT on the outcome.

[jazusamo]

Thanks for relating what took place today in the hearing room Saoirise.

After seeing Jones’ ruling I figured it was something along those lines.

Do you know if Frank’s defense team made any kind of statement at all after the hearing? There’s been nothing said in the media accounts that I’ve been able to find.

Thanks also for attending the hearings!

[smoothsailing]

Wuterich told Jones that he preferred to have a jury composed of Marines; by Marine law, the jury will have at least one-third enlisted personnel. He could have opted to have a trial by a military judge.

"I'm actually happy to see there is a trial date and that this will be over soon," Wuterich told reporters. ". . . It's been a tough five years, seeing everybody else exonerated."

At least 1/3 enlisted?

Fine, here's the jury...Lt. Andrew Grayson, Lcpl Stephen Tatum, Lcpl Justin Sharratt, CPT Randy Stone, CPT Lucas McConnell, LTCOL Jeffrey Chessani

[Saoirise]

I believe it was only Frank making the statement. I am putting my notes together and will post more, as soon as I calm down.

[jazusamo]

Good call, Smooth, that’s exactly who it should be.

Let the people that know most about the incredible dangers of the incident judge their fellow Marine.

[jazusamo]

Wait until tomorrow, I didn’t mean to press. I can’t really imagine how you must feel because I was worked up for quite awhile after just reading the ruling.

[Saoirise]

I love our Marines and I love the values of the Corps, however it's beyond disgusting that this particular leadership would eat it's own. Whatever happened to Semper Fi and “No man left behind”.

[jazusamo]

I honestly don’t know.

The commanders in the field looked into the incident and decided it was a consequence of war.

Sadly, the enemedia, politicians and then the brass decided their must be something sinister because a few Iraqis, that it turns out later were insurgents, screamed war crimes.

[Saoirise]

The commanders in the field looked into the incident and decided it was a consequence of war

Correct, until it became a political firestorm fueld by the Anti-war crowd.

From the Al Associated Press: Abdul-Rahman Najim al-Mashhadani, who heads the Baghdad-based Hammourabi NGO human rights organization, welcomed the ruling. "It is a very important case and we feel happy that attention will be paid to a case dealing with human rights," he said. "This case is regarded as a success for us."

al-Mashhadani is McGirk's buddy I beleive, Frank is the last Haditha case and the Govt has to safe face with the Iraqi's and sacrifice Frank. I'm going to sleep and will add more tomorrow.

[Grimmy]

It is already well known that the vid produced to start this bullcrap, and shopped around for months later by Tim McGurk was pure insurgent propaganda.

Imo, the current judge should be arrested and tried for treason. He’s doing squat all but serving the will and goals of the enemy that produced the bullcrap video of lies and twisted spin.

And he damn well knows it too.

There was a time, when this was fresh, that the program had to be gone through. But now the truth of it all is well known and there is no value in any sense to any form of justice to keep playing this idiot game.

Keeping this going is a travesty that should cost the perfid in a life lost by court order sort of way.

[Girlene]

Thanks for the ping, jaz. I guess I don't understand how finding the appearance of undue command influence isn't cause for dismissal. From the AP article:

The judge ruled there was no record of any "meaningful comment" between the general and an aide who had investigated the case as a military lawyer.

So does this mean because the defense couldn't produce any written/oral communication between Col. Ewers and Gen. Mattis that it can't be proven that there were shennanigans that would have forced a dismissal? Col. Ewers spent a lot of time with both generals while this case was being discussed. Now why would Mattis and Helland waste so much time having Ewers attend these meetings? I seriously doubt it was to fetch coffee. There was an underlying sense that input was desired; to keep Ewers apprised of the prosecution's case, to help guide a course of action....something.

From Tony Perry's article in the LA Times,

........In making his Tuesday ruling, Jones said the prosecution had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that no undue influence existed. In his Friday ruling turning down the defense request, the judge ruled that prosecutors had "overwhelmingly" met that burden...............

But there was no evidence the lawyer who was at the meeting to discuss other legal cases ever discussed the Haditha case at such meetings, Jones ruled.

"There was no chilling effect," Jones said. "The court must deal with facts, not conjecture."

Jones ruled prosecutors did a better job in rebutting the undue influence charges in the Wuterich case than with Chessani.

The prosecution was required to prove no UCI existed. Their proof?..... Mattis/Helland's word and not producing any written/taped communications between the three. I guess Col. Ewers sat in all those meetings because the Generals felt like wasting his time. He had no influence? I'd say his comments for the Frontline special Rules of Engagement that dealt with the Haditha incident were CLEAR indication of influence. Even if he kept his mouth shut during all those meetings, he telegraphed to the nation what he thought of their guilt with these statements:

Col. JOHN EWERS, Staff Judge Advocate, 1st Marine Exped. Force: I think that our Marines were appropriately trained for the mission that we were trying to accomplish. The idea that because we're a blunt force instrument that we're not-we're ill-prepared to do that is a cop-out. The point is, is that we're Marines. We're the-we're the toughest guys on the block. We know how to defend ourselves. We know how to-we know how to aggressively take people down. And to suggest that we can't do the shades of gray in between is a cop-out, and I think it sells Marines short.