NousDefionsDoc
01-05-2005, 10:17
I could be a defense attorney and win. They haven't even exhumed the body and they charge him with murder? WTH?
U.S. Soldier Goes on Trial for Killing Iraqi
Tue Jan 4, 2005 11:39 PM ET
By Jon Herskovitz
FORT HOOD, Texas (Reuters) - Defense lawyers for a U.S. Army sergeant accused of killing an Iraqi civilian by having subordinates push him off a bridge into the Tigris River argued on Tuesday there was no body, no death and no crime.
Sgt. 1st Class Tracy Perkins faces up to 29 years of confinement on charges of involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault, conspiracy and obstruction of justice.
Witnesses called by the prosecution said they heard Perkins say over the radio, "Somebody is going to get wet, tonight."
One of Perkins' lawyers, Capt. Thomas Hurley, said prosecutors cannot even prove a homicide, much less a criminal case.
"There was no death," Hurley said in opening statements. The trial is expected to run for three days.
Prosecutors said a patrol in a platoon led by Perkins forced 19-year-old Zaidoun Hassoun and another man off a bridge and that Hassoun drowned.
"Zaidoun was found, face-down, dead," said prosecutor Capt. Tom Schiffer.
The two Iraqis were suspected of violating a curfew on Jan. 3, 2004, near Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad.
While prosecutors and defense lawyers differed on whether Hassoun drowned, both sides agree that the other Iraqi man survived the encounter with the patrol.
Schiffer's first witness, Army crime scene investigator Irene Cintron, said the surviving Iraqi told her the two men were pushed and fell 10 to 12 feet.
NOT MUCH OF A CURRENT
However, Cintron acknowledged on cross-examination that no body was recovered or exhumed after Hassoun's family said it buried him. She said she did not have a pathologist review a videotape of what the family says is Hassoun's body.
Cintron also told the panel -- the military equivalent of a jury -- that she never measured the water's depth and observed there was "not much of a current." The panel in this court martial consists of three officers and three enlisted personnel.
Members of the Army patrol that forced the Iraqis into the river said the pair were taken to the water's edge at gunpoint. The two entered the water a few seconds apart and one of the two was soon standing on a nearby river bank while Hassoun was still in water that appeared up to his shoulders when they left the scene.
Sgt. Alexis Rincon, who was in the group that forced the men off the bridge, said the orders to push the men in the river were given by 1st Lt. Jack Saville and implemented by Sgt. Reggie Martinez. Both have been charged in the incident.
Perkins was in a different Bradley Fighting Vehicle stopped about 100 yards from the scene and he did not exit the armored vehicle, several soldiers testified.
On Friday, at the same Texas Army base, a military trial will be held for Spc. Charles Graner, the suspected ringleader of abuses by Americans in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.
Graner appeared in several photographs showing Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib in sexually humiliating positions. The photos shocked the world and prompted President Bush to apologize.
Graner faces 24 1/2 years in prison on charges that include conspiracy to mistreat
U.S. Soldier Goes on Trial for Killing Iraqi
Tue Jan 4, 2005 11:39 PM ET
By Jon Herskovitz
FORT HOOD, Texas (Reuters) - Defense lawyers for a U.S. Army sergeant accused of killing an Iraqi civilian by having subordinates push him off a bridge into the Tigris River argued on Tuesday there was no body, no death and no crime.
Sgt. 1st Class Tracy Perkins faces up to 29 years of confinement on charges of involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault, conspiracy and obstruction of justice.
Witnesses called by the prosecution said they heard Perkins say over the radio, "Somebody is going to get wet, tonight."
One of Perkins' lawyers, Capt. Thomas Hurley, said prosecutors cannot even prove a homicide, much less a criminal case.
"There was no death," Hurley said in opening statements. The trial is expected to run for three days.
Prosecutors said a patrol in a platoon led by Perkins forced 19-year-old Zaidoun Hassoun and another man off a bridge and that Hassoun drowned.
"Zaidoun was found, face-down, dead," said prosecutor Capt. Tom Schiffer.
The two Iraqis were suspected of violating a curfew on Jan. 3, 2004, near Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad.
While prosecutors and defense lawyers differed on whether Hassoun drowned, both sides agree that the other Iraqi man survived the encounter with the patrol.
Schiffer's first witness, Army crime scene investigator Irene Cintron, said the surviving Iraqi told her the two men were pushed and fell 10 to 12 feet.
NOT MUCH OF A CURRENT
However, Cintron acknowledged on cross-examination that no body was recovered or exhumed after Hassoun's family said it buried him. She said she did not have a pathologist review a videotape of what the family says is Hassoun's body.
Cintron also told the panel -- the military equivalent of a jury -- that she never measured the water's depth and observed there was "not much of a current." The panel in this court martial consists of three officers and three enlisted personnel.
Members of the Army patrol that forced the Iraqis into the river said the pair were taken to the water's edge at gunpoint. The two entered the water a few seconds apart and one of the two was soon standing on a nearby river bank while Hassoun was still in water that appeared up to his shoulders when they left the scene.
Sgt. Alexis Rincon, who was in the group that forced the men off the bridge, said the orders to push the men in the river were given by 1st Lt. Jack Saville and implemented by Sgt. Reggie Martinez. Both have been charged in the incident.
Perkins was in a different Bradley Fighting Vehicle stopped about 100 yards from the scene and he did not exit the armored vehicle, several soldiers testified.
On Friday, at the same Texas Army base, a military trial will be held for Spc. Charles Graner, the suspected ringleader of abuses by Americans in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.
Graner appeared in several photographs showing Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib in sexually humiliating positions. The photos shocked the world and prompted President Bush to apologize.
Graner faces 24 1/2 years in prison on charges that include conspiracy to mistreat