A U.S. soldier was taken into custody after an Afghan detainee was found dead in his cell, apparently from a gunshot wound, NATO said in a statement Tuesday night.

Military.com reports:

An American Soldier was charged Wednesday with killing two fellow U.S. troops and wounding a third after an argument last month in a former Iraqi insurgent stronghold turned deadly. Army Spc. Neftaly Platero was charged with two counts of murder and one count of attempted murder in a Sept. 23 shooting in Fallujah, about 40 miles (65 kilometers) west of Baghdad.

Military.com reports:

Army Spc. Tyler Ellingboe recently noted on his Facebook page that he won’t be home for Christmas. “I will not be taking leave and will not be leaving Alaska,” he wrote. “Short on money and I have too much on my plate right now.” Ellingboe and fellow Soldier Sgt. Alexander Valdez are under investigation by the Army as a result of their actions around handcuffing and attempting to place a journalist under citizen’s arrest after he attempted to question Joe Miller, a Tea Party candidate in Alaska’s U.S. Senate race. The Army is looking into whether the two Soldiers’ conduct was proper as they took on the role of civilian security guards.

Navy Times reports:

A Coast Guard petty officer charged in a fatal boat collision in San Diego Bay last December was arraigned in a military court Thursday. Boatswain’s Mate 3rd Class Paul Ramos, 21, did not enter a plea during the hearing, held at Naval Base San Diego before a Coast Guard judge based in Alexandria, Va., who presided over the hearing via video teleconference. Ramos made no statement to the judge, Capt. Gary Felicetti.

Note the use of VTC to do the arraignment.

Navy Times reports:

The top sailor on the amphibious transport dock ship New York was fired Thursday in Norfolk for fraternizing with a female shipmate, Naval Surface Force Atlantic said.

Navy Times reports:

Federal investigators were mistaken when they claimed that a Coast Guard crew member sent text messages just before his boat collided with another vessel and killed an 8-year-old boy before a holiday boat parade in San Diego Bay. The National Transportation Safety Board reported in August that Petty Officer 3rd Class Lavelle Teague made and received six texts only 10 to 15 minutes before the Dec. 20 crash. A revised memo issued in September says the texts were made hours earlier, attributing the error on a time zone difference in phone records.

Huuum, wonder what else is messed up in the case?

Army Times reports the Diamond case is over:

A military appeals court won’t consider an appeal from a former Fort Bragg soldier convicted of killing his lover’s husband, who was a pilot at a neighboring Air Force base. The Fayetteville Observer reported Wednesday the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces rejected John Diamond’s petition.

Sign of San Diego has this interesting point:

At the prosecution’s request, the judge will issue a partial gag order on the lawyers. Neither side will be able to make background or off-the-record comments, and a court-appointed officer will review press releases before they are issued.

You’ll remember I’ve posted about the release of the UCMJ Article 32 IO’s report. What I find interesting is that the parties will be banned from media disclosures, but not the prosecution. Think about it, the United States is the party prosecuting the case. So how come the United States can issue media releases? So, the United States, the prosecutors, get to issue media releases but have effectively barred the defense from responding to erroneous press releases from the prosecution or for that matter prosecution press releases. Not good. I hope the defense objected to this imbalanced procedure.

Nearly five years after 24 Iraqi men, women and children were slain by a Camp Pendleton squad as it searched for a roadside bomber, the last man to face criminal charges from the incident is about to go on trial. Wuterich’s trial —- which is scheduled to start Sept. 13 and last up to three weeks[.]

The Department of Defense is investigating whether 80 wounded American service members in Iraq were improperly used as subjects in a test of a possible treatment for brain injuries, according to the Pentagon’s Office of Inspector General. In addition to the defense investigation, the US Navy is conducting an inquiry into alleged research misconduct and potential violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, according to Jennifer Plozai, a spokeswoman for the Pentagon’s inspector general, in response to questions from the Globe. She declined to spell out the nature of the alleged misconduct.

tip Blogcritics.org

Kate Wiltrout reports the retrial of Richard Mott at NOB, NorVA.

Almost two years after a Navy judge found Seaman Richard Mott guilty of attempted premeditated murder and sentenced him to 12 years in prison, he got a second chance this week to plead his case before a new judge and a military jury. Like last time, Mott’s lawyers argued that he should not be held criminally responsible for attacking a fellow sailor because he was suffering from paranoid delusions at the time of the attack.

Here is a link to United States v. Mott, NMCCA 200900115 (N-M.C. Ct. Crim. App. 24 November 2009).

Kitsap Sun reports that:

A doctor who is being expelled from the Navy was charged by Kitsap County prosecutors Thursday with failing to register as a sex offender, according to attorneys familiar with the case.

Here is a piece by the Island Packet which follows up on the two MCAS Beaufort Marines pending civilian charges.

Air station officials are awaiting the case’s outcome before proceeding with possible military charges against the Marines, who have been under barracks restriction since the incident.

Seems like the R.C.M. 707 clock is running, and perhaps the Article 13, UCMJ consideration? Remember, Liberty Risk programs do not apply in CONUS, they are an overseas practice only.

Fort Scott Tribune has this reminder about falling asleep on post.

To fall asleep on guard duty in a combat zone could be FATAL for the soldier and or his comrades in arms, especially if the area is known to be SWARMING WITH ENEMY GUERRILLAS!

A little more about the moss growing on Rolling Stone from AP.

The U.S. Army inspector general is investigating whether aides to former Afghanistan commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal were insubordinate when they made a series of derogatory comments about top civilian leaders to a Rolling Stone reporter, McClatchy Newspapers has learned.

I also heard on my drive back from Fort Bragg last night that the reporter has had his 101st ABN embed revoked based on a lack of trust and concern he will not follow pre-established ground rules.

Air Force Times reports that:

The former top enlisted airman at Air Force Materiel Command will defend himself against 19 charges that include adultery and misuse of his government position at a December court-martial.

Here’s another piece (in military.com) on the reinstatement move for MajGen Lavelle:

In an Aug. 4 statement, the Pentagon said that President Obama had posthumously nominated Maj. Gen. John D. Lavelle to the rank of general after the Air Force Board for the Correction of Military Records found the former commander of the 7th Air Force had rightfully executed his orders and had not participated in falsifying records. “In 2007, newly released and declassified information resulted in evidence that Lavelle was authorized by President Richard Nixon to conduct the bombing missions,” the Pentagon release stated.

When Soldiers Become Killers is a piece in Gulf News.

“I came over here because I wanted to kill people.” -Private First Class Steven Green, US Army; interview given to Washington Post reporter Andrew Tilghman; Iraq, February 2006 “I am truly sorry for what I did in Iraq and I am sorry for the pain my actions, and the actions of my co-defendants, have caused you and your family … I helped to destroy a family and end the lives of four of my fellow human beings …” -Steven Green, ex-US Army; addressing the Al Janabi family in US Court, 2009.

The Hook reports that:

Citizenship and Immigration Canada has advised immigration officers that military deserters seeking permanent residence should be treated as “high profile, contentious and sensitive cases,” and kicked upstairs for resolution.

I posted the other day about Fricke, here is some more reporting on his death:

The Virginia Pilot reports that:

Former Navy Lt. Cmdr. Michael Fricke, 54, was about a month away from being released for the crime when he died Thursday after being beaten with a baseball bat in a fight. The high-profile case went on for about 15 years, starting with the investigation of the murder and wending its way through military and civilian courts.

Who is that phantom Justice Thomas (Ledger-Enquirer)?

On July 20, Taitz posted a motion requesting that she be allowed to verify that it is, in fact, Thomas’ signature on the denial of her application. She’s also sent her request for stay to Justice Samuel Alito, though she said a clerk told her it had been returned because of a small technical issue.

There are some things even a bank won’t do:

As he sits in the Bell County Jail, accused in the Nov. 5 Fort Hood shootings that left 13 dead, Maj. Nidal Hasan continues to receive his monthly U.S. Army paycheck; based on his rank and experience, it is probably more than $6,000. But Hasan, who is charged with 13 counts of murder in the attack, is not a standard defendant. And he’s having a hard time finding a bank to take his money. According to his civilian attorney John Galligan, Bank of America notified Hasan last month that it was closing his account and no area bank has agreed to open an account for the Army psychiatrist.

In a court martial trial that concluded after a panel’s deliberations stretched into the early hours of Saturday morning at Andrews Joint Base, a local Airman First Class was found not guilty of the charges brought against him. As ABC 7 News reported last week, the charges were brought against A1C Marvin Skipper, Jr., after he fell asleep a second time while on security duty–even though doctors had ordered that he not be placed on that type of duty for medical reasons. Skipper, Jr., an Iraq war veteran with an exemplary record, first fell asleep while on security duty in May 2008. Although he was baffled at why this had happened, Skipper, 28, agreed to receive an Article 15 . . . But he also immediately sought medical treatment. And doctors diagnosed him with sleep apnea. After two surgeries failed to correct the problem, doctors ordered that he not be deployed, drive government vehicles, or carry a gun. A medical discharge was in process. But after acknowledging the document citing his medical condition, base command placed Skipper back on security duty again in April (emphasis added). And he fell asleep again.

This one goes in the why did they do that category. Watch to see if a report shows up in the Capital Flyer the base paper.

Queerty.com asks:

Did Dan Choi Violate Military Law By Wearing His Uniform After He Was Discharged?

I think the answer is probably yes that he may have violated a federal statute. But as a practical matter this ought to remain an interesting question and nothing more. Sounds like he would raise an affirmative defense of mistake as to whether he was still “a member,” whether believable or not. See, 10 U. S. Code 771.

Except as otherwise provided by law, no person except a member of the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marine Corps, as the case may be, may wear— (1) the uniform, or a distinctive part of the uniform, of the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marine Corps; or (2) a uniform any part of which is similar to a distinctive part of the uniform of the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marine Corps.

Interestingly no reference to the Coast Guard or the Commissioned Corps of the Public Health Service or NOAA. See, Article 2(8), UCMJ, 10 U. S. Code 802(8).

The guardian.co.uk has this book review:

The blackest hearts: War crimes in Iraq. In March 2006, four US soldiers, strung out after months in the deadly battleground south of Baghdad, hatched a plan: to carry out one of the worst war crimes ever committed in Iraq. This is an edited extract from Black Hearts: One Platoon’s Descent Into Madness In Iraq’s Triangle Of Death, by Jim Frederick, published on 6 August by Macmillan[.]

The Marines website has this new liberty policy:

All service members assigned to Marine Corps Bases Japan/III Marine Expeditionary Force in pay grades E3 and below, and all red card holders, must have a liberty buddy for off-base liberty.

You remember discussion of the CSI effect in criminal trials. Well here’s a new piece on the impact of “Lie to Me” a TV show which claims to teach people how to detect liars.

Timothy R. Levine, Kim B. Serota, Hillary C. Shulman (in press). The Impact of Lie to Me on Viewers’ Actual Ability to Detect Deception Communication Research first published on June 17, 2010 doi:10.1177/0093650210362686 The new television series Lie to Me portrays a social scientist solving crimes through his ability to read nonverbal communication. Promotional materials claim the content is based on actual science. Participants (N = 108) watched an episode of Lie to Me, a different drama, or no program and then judged a series of honest and deceptive interviews. Lie to Me viewers were no better at distinguishing truths from lies but were more likely than control participants to misidentify honest interviewees as deceptive. Watching Lie to Me decreases truth bias thereby increasing suspicion of others while at the same time reducing deception detection ability. Hat tip to Karen Franklin.

And to Deception Blog.

This report is consistent with research that shows police officers are no better at detecting liars than the average person, and no different to tossing a coin. See e.g., Meissner & Kassin, “He’s guilty!”: Investigator Bias in Judgments of Truth and Deception, 26 Law & Human Behavior 469 (2002); Kassin, Meissner, & Norwick, “I’d Know a False Confession if I Saw One”: A Comparative Study of College Students and Police Investigators, 29(2) Law & Human Behavior 211 (2005); Max Mizner, Detecting Lies Using Demeanor, Bias, and Context, 29 Cardozo L. Rev. 2557 (2008)

An Army intelligence analyst suspected of leaking classified information to Wikileaks has still not been charged with any crime, three weeks after being arrested and put in pre-trial confinement.

This is not an unusual time. Under Article 10, UCMJ, the government has a 120 window. However, that does not mean that the charges can or will be dismissed if the government takes longer than the 120 days.

However, in the meantime here is some of the back-story which may have some relevance to SPC Manning currently in pretrial confinement at Camp Arifjan.

The Nikkei for Civil Rights & Redress and the Asian American Vietnam Veterans Organization will screen the documentary, “Lt. Watada” on June 19 at the David Henry Hwang Theatre at 7 p.m. “Lt. Watada” is an in-depth look at the case of Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to refuse to deploy to Iraq on the grounds that the war was illegal and immoral.

A Camp Pendleton Marine whose murder conviction was recently overturned was released Monday after serving four years in prison for a major Iraqi war crimes case, his lawyer said. An emotional Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins III vowed to be the best Marine he could be while he waits for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces to review his case, defense lawyer Babu Kaza told The Associated Press after leaving the closed hearing at Camp Pendleton.

No. 10-5003/MC. U.S., Appellant v. Lawrence G. HUTCHINS, Appellee. CCA 200800393. Notice is hereby given that a certificate for review of the decision of the United States Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals was filed under Rule 22 on this date on the following issues: WHETHER THE NAVY-MARINE CORPS COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS ERRED IN FINDING, INTER ALIA, THAT THE MILITARY JUDGE SEVERED THE ATTORNEY-CLIENT RELATIONSHIP WITH CAPTAIN BASS? WHETHER UNDER R.C.M. 505(d)(2)(B), THE NAVY-MARINE CORPS COURT INCORRECTLY FOUND NO “GOOD CAUSE” ON THE RECORD FOR THE REPLACEMENT OF APPELLANT’S SECOND DETAILED DEFENSE COUNSEL WITH ANOTHER COUNSEL? WHETHER THE LOWER COURT APPLIED THE WRONG STANDARD AND ERRONEOUSLY PRESUMED, WITHOUT ASSESSING, PREJUDICE AND SET ASIDE THE FINDINGS AND SENTENCE, WHERE APPELLANT’S STATUTORY RIGHTS, AND CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO EFFECTIVE ASSISTANCE OF COUNSEL, WERE SATISFIED THROUGHOUT TRIAL?

LA Times report.

An Army captain from Colorado charged with killing two Iraqi civilians has been convicted of lesser charges in Iraq. Military officials say Capt. Carl Bjork was found guilty of reckless endangerment and negligent homicide in a general court-martial on Tuesday. He was reprimanded and will lose a third of his salary for one year.

Army Times reports:

The mother of an Army specialist from Oshkosh who was fatally shot at Fort Hood in Texas says she’s disappointed in the sentence given to the soldier who killed her son. Armando Baca will spend 20 years in a military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., for shooting 30-year-old Ryan Schlack during a party at the base.

Air Force Times reports that: Chief Gurney’s Article 32, UCMJ, hearing is scheduled for 26 May 2010, at Wright-Patt AFB, OH. bnd.com also has a post.

Air Force Times reports:

Two special operations pilots flying across Africa took a gamble that cost them big time. Even though they had six passengers, a crew member and not a clue where to find an emergency landing strip, they decided to risk flying on fumes to stay on schedule. Call them fuel-hardy, refusing twice to fill up with Jet-A gas. The twin-engine DHC-8 crashed in remote scrubland, wounding all nine onboard. Five had broken bones. A few simply suffered bruises. Three had back injuries so serious that they couldn’t walk. As for the $7 million plane, the Air Force wrote it off as a total loss.

And no disciplinary action.

If she can’t have justice for her slain soldier husband, she’d at least like a Purple Heart. New York widow Barbara Allen is battling the National Guard for withholding the military honor from her husband, who was killed in 2005 while serving in Iraq. The two men were allegedly the victims of “fragging” — killed by a disgruntled soldier under their command. But the accused soldier, Staff Sgt. Alberto Martinez, 45, was found not guilty of both murders at a military trial in 2008. Allen’s family later found out that during the investigation, Martinez had offered to plead guilty to the charges in exchange for a lifetime prison sentence instead of the death penalty. Military prosecutors rejected his plea and proceeded to trial, but a jury did not convict him. Lt. Allen’s death isn’t considered the act of an enemy combatant by the military — but his wife disagrees.

Her claim about the PTAO is consistent with what I have heard from a potential witness involved in the case.

According to Jeff Paterson of Courage to Resist, an Oakland-based organization dedicated to supporting military objectors like Hall, he was not jailed for the song, but was instead jailed “in retaliation for his formal complaint of inadequate mental health services available to him at Fort Stewart. The Army used an angry song that Spc. Hall, a combat veteran of the Iraq War suffering from post-traumatic stress, had produced criticizing the stop-loss policy as the pretext.” What put the 34-year-old New York City native in the brig were, according to Paterson, Hall’s persistent assertions of inadequate mental health care that culminated in a December 7 complaint to the Army Investigator General. Just five days after that, Hall was charged with violating “good order and discipline” at Fort Stewart, Georgia, and was shipped out of the country for a court martial in Kuwait. On Feb. 20 Hall wrote, “A charge that was not a threat before, but all of a sudden became a threat now. I communicated a need for mental evaluation – not a threat.”

Here is an excellent review, by Dwight “ML” Sullivan at CAAFLog on the political posturing, pseudo-lawyering, and plain gaffs about these cases.

First SEAL prosecution imminent

It is my recollection that I learned about the Know Nothing party in history 101. Thanks to Wikipedia I can get my memory back.

The Know Nothing movement was a nativist American political movement of the 1840s and 1850s. It was empowered by popular fears that the country was being overwhelmed by German and Irish Catholic immigrants, who were often regarded as hostile to U.S. values and controlled by the Popein Rome. Mainly active from 1854 to 1856, it strove to curb immigration and naturalization, though its efforts met with little success. There were few prominent leaders, and the largely middle-class and entirely Protestant membership fragmented over the issue of slavery. Most ended up joining the Republican Party by the time of the 1860 presidential election.

I venture that LTC Lakin and his supporters, along with a number of other could fit well into a no nothing party.

Last August, Travis Bishop refused to serve in Afghanistan. Having filed for Conscientious Objector (CO) status, Bishop, based at Fort Hood, Texas, in the US Army’s 57th Expeditionary Signal Battalion, was court-martialed and sentenced to 12 months in a military brig. He was released from the brig today.

Bishop served his time in Northwest Joint Regional Correctional Facility at Fort Lewis, Washington. This military brig is notorious for being a particularly difficult jail to serve time.

gazette.com reports that:

A Fort Carson soldier will face court martial next week in the Halloween rape of a woman on post last October, two months after the soldier’s return from his first deployment to Iraq.

Eyewitness News 3 reports that:

The first cadet ever court-martialed at the Coast Guard Academy in New London has lost another appeal. Cadet Webster Smith has filed a series of appeals since his conviction in 2006. Now, his only hope is to get his case in front of the United States Supreme Court.

United States v. Smith, 68 M.J. ___ (C.A.A.F. 2010).

Three Republicans are vying for the nomination to run for the seat and all three are military vets — but only one has the kind of star power that comes with a personal story that extends from Hell’s Kitchen in Manhattan to the fast-money world of Wall Street, and includes film-making, a best-selling book, an appearance on “The Daily Show” and charges of murdering two Iraqi civilians. But before the GOP gets too excited about seeing former Marine 1st Lt. Ilario Pantano take a seat in Congress, it had better face up to the fact that the former infantry officer isn’t your typical Red stater. . . . April 2004 found him leading a platoon in Mahmudiya, Iraq, where he had in custody two Iraqis he suspected were involved in anti-coalition activities. According to various accounts, Marines had already searched the men’s car and found no weapons. But when weapons were found in a nearby house, Pantano wanted the car stripped down for another search. Then the shooting started. When it was over, both Iraqis were dead. Pantano said he killed them in self defense. Marine prosecutors called it murder and roughly a year later he faced an Article 32 hearing on the charges. But when witness testimony fell apart from inconsistencies and autopsies on the Iraqis’ exhumed bodies supported Pantano’s version of events, the charges were dismissed. . . . “I went out to do a dirty job for my country and in the process I got jammed up,” he said. “I never broke with my Corps. I never broke with my country. I never said I was a victim. I took responsibility. I did what I did. I killed men in combat and if you don’t like it, don’t send men to war.”

Military.com reports

Mansfield News Journal reports.

A war resister who fled the U.S. for Canada, but was deported to face a court-martial, has been released from confinement. Cliff Cornell spent less than a year in a military prison at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, and was released this morning [15 January 2010]. Cornell, who fled the U.S. for Canada in 2005 to avoid having to fight in Iraq, wants to return to Gabriola Island, B.C., Canada.

Canadian Press reports.

In a 16 January 2010 post Overlawyered blog notes:

Army seeks to court-martial soldier in Afghanistan for possessing “child pornography” when his mother sends him family photos that include a four-year-old in a swimsuit. [AP/WaPo via Riehl; WQAD]

If you’ve been following this one you’ll know that the charges also include possession of other adult pornography, all of which would be a violation of General Order #1. The accused has been held in Afghanistan, and has apparently now been there 17 months – a significant passing of the 400 days boots-on-the-ground policy.

Terri Miller said she had great respect for members of the armed services, but the way her son’s case was being handled had changed her mind about the military. “This is nothing against the troops,” she said, “but the military can go to hell.”

pjstar.com reports.

[T]he accusers are 3 former Iraqi police and a former Iraqi intel officer who are currently detainees in Iraq. Reports have also surfaced that the detainees were allowed to speak with each other about their claims. It’s also feasible to conclude the detainees have ample motive to fabricate in order to deflect blame from themselves. In addition when an interpreter must relay testimony there is added room for error and inaccuracy.

There appear to be some ROE issues in the case, because of this reference:

Herschel Smith, writing about Rules of Engagement for Afghanistan at The Captain’s Journal, said, “Our problems with the existing ROE and RUF are legendary, and include the insurmountable initial problem that they are constructed around defensive operations and personal and unit self defense and include no discussion or guidance for offensive operations. This is why General Kearney wanted to charge two Army snipers with murder for targeting a Taliban commander who didn’t happen to be holding a weapon.”

The charges appear to be: two charges of premeditated murder and one of reckless endangerment.

Article 118, UCMJ.

Any person subject to this chapter whom without justification or excuse, unlawfully kills a human being, when he- – (1) has a premeditated design to kill; (2) intends to kill or inflict great bodily harm; (3) is engaged in an act which is inherently dangerous to others and evinces a wanton disregard of human life; or (4) is engaged in the perpetration or attempted perpetration of burglary, sodomy, rape, robbery, or aggravated arson; is guilty of murder, and shall suffer such punishment as a court-martial may direct, except that if found guilty under clause (1) or (4), he shall suffer death or imprisonment for life as a court-martial may direct.

There’s no indication in the reports that the case is referred capital. Therefore, if convicted of at least one of the two premeditated murder specifications the punishment is either confinement for life or confinement for life without the possibility of parole. The reckless endangerment charge carries a one year confinement and a BCD as the potential maximum. The military has a unitary sentence so the maximum exposure would be one Life/LWOP, even if convicted of all of the charges. This is different to the civilian community where the potential maximum would be two life sentences and one year total.

Article 134, UCMJ (Reckless endangerment).

(1) That the accused did engage in conduct; (2) That the conduct was wrongful and reckless or wanton; (3) That the conduct was likely to produce death or grievous bodily harm to another person; and (4) That, under the circumstances, the conduct of the accused was to the prejudice of good order and discipline in the armed forces or was of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces.

Here is a link to a Facebook page set up in support of CPT Bjork.

The United States military has decided to refer charges against an Army captain from Evergreen who is accused of ordering Iraqi officers to kill two Iraqi civilians.

Army Times reports.

The trial for the Navy SEAL accused of punching an alleged al-Qaida terrorist while in U.S. custody in Iraq has been postponed until May 3, but the trial will remain in Norfolk. Capt. Moira Modzelewski granted government prosecutors the continuance on the grounds that most of the evidence in the case is still undergoing a classification review and has yet to be seen by either the prosecution or the defense.

Navy Times reports.

It may be meaningless at the moment that the trial hasn’t been moved. It seems that this MJ is being cautious in terms of making sure the discovery issues are ironed out before deciding what to do about venue. The court-martial is still pending.

Here’s why the case may not move, thanks CAAFLog for the link.

Another judge has ruled that two other SEALs accused of lying to investigators should be tried in Iraq, site of the alleged assault, because they have the right to confront their accuser in open court. But McCabe’s attorney, Neal Puckett, says there’s no need to move his trial because he doesn’t need to question the detainee.

The Army’s attempt to stem a rising tide of suicides made it impossible for a Fort Bliss soldier convicted of cruelty toward subordinates to get a fair trial, the soldier’s parents say. “I still maintain that this was a miscarriage of justice,” said John Taylor, father of Pvt. Jarrett Taylor. “They needed a conviction and they got it. É This is a sham.” Taylor said his son, a sergeant at the time, was trying to help soldiers on their first deployment in Iraq survive in a combat zone.

elpasotimes.com reports on this concluded court-martial for violations of Article 93, and 107, UCMJ. This is not the only court-martial to have arisen from this case.

Charges against Daniel Weber, 24, of Frankenmuth, Mich., were dropped with the understanding that he would testify against the others. He is no longer in the Army.

Sgt. Enoch Chatman, 30, of West Covina, Calif., and Staff Sgt. Bob Clements, 29, of Eastland, Texas, face more serious charges and are scheduled for courts-martial early next year, Caggins said.