Defense attorneys for a soldier charged in the death of three Iraqi detainees want the soldier's commanding officer to testify about whether he ordered the brigade to kill all military-age Iraqi men.
A military judge was due to hear arguments yesterday about whether the commander should testify in the murder trial of Staff Sargeant Ray Girouard scheduled for March 13.
Colonel Michael Steele, former commander of the 101st Airborne's 3rd Brigade, has denied giving such an order, and he invoked his right not to testify during an earlier hearing.
"The government is attempting to preclude us from soliciting any testimony that has to do with any orders given by Colonol Steele," attorney Anita Gorecki told reporters.
Military prosecutors at Fort Campbell will not discuss the case.
Girouard, 24, is the last of four soldiers charged with murder to face trial. The others pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.
The soldiers initially told investigators they shot the detainees during a May 9 raid in Samarra because they were attempting to flee and because commanders had given them orders to kill all military-age men.
But two of the soldiers now say Girouard ordered them to cut the detainees free and shoot them as they fled. One soldier also said Girouard cut him to make it look as if there was a struggle.
Gorecki also said that prosecutors were rying to limit her cross-examination of Private first class Corey Clagett and Specialist William Hunsaker, who both agreed to testify against Girouard in plea agreements.
Clagett and Hunsaker were sentenced in January to 18 years in prison. A third soldier, Specialist Juston R. Graber, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and was sentenced to nine months in a military jail.
"Staff Sargeant Girouard is a scapegoat for the actions of others," Gorecki said. "The key witnesses against him have, in return for drastically lower sentences, agreed to testify against Girouard and have been granted immunity."
The case is one of two involving soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division accused of killing Iraqis during a deployment to Iraq that ended in September.
Four soldiers from the division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team were accused of raping and killing an Iraqi teenager and killing three others in her family last March. A former Army private also faces murder and rape charges in federal court.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion