Posted on 01/06/2012 1:12:09 PM PST by SmithL
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- Days after the last U.S. troops left Iraq, a federal appeals court ended a lawsuit over an episode that produced one of the more disturbing images of the war: the grisly killings of four Blackwater security contractors and the hanging of a pair of their bodies from a bridge in Fallujah.
Families of the victims reached a confidential settlement with the company's corporate successor, Arlington, Va.-based Academi, and the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the suit last week. The settlement was first reported Friday by The Virginian-Pilot of Norfolk, Va.
The deal ends the families' hopes that a public trial would expose the events that led to Iraqi insurgents killing the four contractors in 2004 and hanging two of their corpses, said Jason Helvenston of Orlando, Fla., brother of slain Blackwater guard Stephen "Scott" Helvenston.
Images from the scene flashed around the world and triggered a massive U.S. military attack on Fallujah that featured street-by-street fighting.
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
“Blackwater, formerly based in North Carolina, countered that the men were betrayed by the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps and targeted in a well-planned ambush. The company said the ambush likely would have had the same result even if they had stronger weapons, armored vehicles, maps or even more men.”
Rather lame defense. “We shouldn’t be liable as it wasn’t due to our failure to plan tactically that got these guys killed. We failed to plan comprehensively!”
Not surprised this thread has no few comments either. Bad news from Dubya’s reign of error is never popular.
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