Up periscope

Air Force Times reports:

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.