Marine accused of killing Iraqi soldier: Attacker says he saw possible enemy link

San Jose Mercury News / Los Angeles Times ^ | September 4, 2007 | Tony Perry

[river rat]

Hmmmmm...

A two man NIGHT time SENTRY post...in a formerly VERY dangerous site — Fallujah.

The Arab, Masked, SMOKING at NIGHT, running his mouth on his cell phone in a language I couldn’t understand, and refusing to quit doing both - would be a risk and exposure I wouldn’t have accepted. Three brothers from his own Bn killed by snipers in Fallujah the previous few days, had to be bearing heavy on this young Marines mind...

I’m afraid that I would have killed the bastard too... for putting my life at risk by his smoking and inattention — and for continuing to do so after being told to quit..

Once the fight started -— the stabbing certainly could be justified...

I wouldn’t make a big deal over the number of bayonet strikes... All Marines are trained to continue the attack until the foe is CERTAINLY dead - especially if there are no other threats immediately present.

[RedRover]

Thank you so much!

[Girlene]

Mindbender26 --- "The Marine Corps declined to release the hearing officer’s report that led Mattis to order a court-martial.

And why might I ask? "

MrEdd --- Your honor, the Officer corps respectfully refuses to release that information on the grounds that they are tired of seeing the accused exonerated when more of the evidence is released. /Sutton

Good one, MrEdd. :-) According to the North County Times article back in mid August, the Marine Corps had never issued a press release about the incident, the hearing, NOTHING. When the Marine Corps spokesman was asked why,

A Marine Corps spokesman was unable to say why the service had not issued any disclosure of the incident until this week. [in August]

Hmmmmmm.

[jazusamo]

The Arab, Masked, SMOKING at NIGHT, running his mouth on his cell phone in a language I couldn’t understand, and refusing to quit doing both - would be a risk and exposure I wouldn’t have accepted.

Exactly! If he'd been out there alone and trying to get himself killed that's his business but he was risking Holmes' life no matter who he was talking to on the phone. I can't see the justification for prosecuting Holmes.

Thanks for the ping, Girlene

[4woodenboats]

The Indy Star article from 8/17...

When Marine Lance Cpl. Delano V. Holmes returned to the United States from the battlefront in Iraq, the Indianapolis man thought he was heading home to be reunited with his family.

Instead, after landing at an Air Force base in California in February, Holmes, 21, was put in shackles and taken to the maximum-security section of the brig at Camp Pendleton. After the military's version of a grand jury hearing July 18 and 25, the Ben Davis High School grad was charged with murdering an Iraqi soldier as the two stood watch at a tiny observation post at Camp Fallujah. Holmes also was charged with making a false statement about the incident. Holmes doesn't deny he killed the man but says he acted in self-defense. A Marine Corps spokesman at Camp Pendleton confirmed the charges against Holmes but provided few details on the case.

Those who know Holmes, including a teacher, his foster mother and fraternity brothers from his days at IUPUI, described him as a "good guy" who joined the Marines because of the Corps' reputation as the toughest and most demanding branch of the service.

Holmes graduated from Ben Davis in 2003. Sandy Plyley, a former math teacher and now assistant principal there, remembered Holmes as a "very pleasant, friendly kid," who always had a smile on his face.

He joined the Marine Reserve in 2004 and continued his political science studies at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, the Rev. Jenni Crowley said. Crowley came to know Holmes during his junior year at Ben Davis and then became his foster mother. Even though he is now an adult , her family is in the process of formally adopting Holmes, who assisted Crowley with her duties as director of the youth program at Orchard Park Presbyterian Church.

She said Holmes volunteered for duty in Iraq when he heard the Marines needed more machine gunners in the field. Under fire

Holmes was a member of Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment, a Marine Reserve unit based in Lansing, Mich.

After months of training and preparation, the outfit arrived in Iraq in September. Holmes served with a quick-response team, said his California attorney, Stephen Cook, which swung into action whenever there was trouble. By October, roadside bombs had claimed the first lives of Marines in his battalion.

The quick-response team saw constant action, Cook said. Statements from Holmes' officers and fellow enlisted men painted a picture of a serviceman who was highly respected. "He was consistently placed in a lead gun truck as the lead turret gunner because they trusted and valued his judgment," Cook said. "He was cool under pressure." A former federal prosecutor in San Diego, Cook said the steady toll of wounded and slain that the unit suffered had begun to wear on Holmes by December.

On the night of Dec. 31, Holmes was paired with an Iraqi soldier he had never met before to stand watch, Pvt. Munther Jasem Muhammed Hassin.

The two occupied a small observation post that was elevated above Camp Fallujah, Cook said. The post was just big enough for the two men to squeeze into with their gear. Cook described it as an "extremely dangerous post," one that had been shot at a number of times in the days before the incident, including one time when a sniper wounded a Marine.

A language barrier kept the two men from talking to each other, Cook said. "He knew nothing about the soldier's background, his training." Some Marines had concerns about the training the Iraqi soldiers had received and whom they were loyal to, he added. As Holmes stood watch, Hassin pulled out a cell phone, the glow of which lit up their post, Cook said. The man was doing something with the keypad on his cell phone, and Holmes couldn't tell what he was doing. Hassin quickly put the phone away and lit a cigarette.

Holmes tried repeatedly to get Hassin to put the cigarette out, Cook said, and made gestures and did everything he could think of to get his point across. The soldier only laughed.

"Finally, Lance Corporal Holmes reached over and knocked it out of his hands. The soldier grabbed him and they started wrestling."

In the pitch black, Holmes could feel Hassin move his hands and thought he was reaching for a weapon, Cook said. The only weapon available was a bayonet strapped to his chest, Holmes' attorney said. "He pulled it out and started striking at the soldier until he stopped fighting back."

Then Holmes called for help.

Aftermath Christopher Kolomjec was the military attorney attached to Holmes' unit, as well as the public affairs officer. Kolomjec was among the early advisers to the unit commander about the case, but he declined to talk in detail about the facts or the decision to charge Holmes. Kolomjec said he did not know Holmes well before the slaying, but that he was not known to be a trouble-maker. If anything, he was considered "quiet and reserved," Kolomjec said.

Now in private practice and living in Grosse Pointe Farms, Mich., Kolomjec said Holmes was sent back to California soon after the slaying partly because the unit had nowhere to confine someone accused of such a crime at the camp. Kolomjec said he was sent to Camp Pendleton, north of San Diego, to be detained pending the outcome of the military's investigation.

He is scheduled for court-martial in December. When Crowley first heard from her foster son after he reached Camp Pendleton, he had one message for her: He was innocent.

"It's a nightmare," he told her.

Something doesn't jive ~ were charges brought before or after he left Iraq? And was his "equivelant of a grand jury" an Article 32?

And WTF is with locking up everyone NCIS goes after? Clearly it wasn't neccesary in the Haditha cases, and just as clearly were innocent men made to suffer over a year in the brig in the Hamandia cases.

Why not just confine him to base?

What's supposed to be his motive, anyway - he just can't stand smokers? This is absolutely f'n insane.

[RedRover]

Hope we can get the facts out in the open. As they say, sunlight is the best disinfectant. So let the sunshine in.

[Ramius]

I believe the Marine.

He was right to confront the Iraqi for the light discipline. I have no doubt that in the struggle woth this Iraqi he was genuinely in fear for his life.

Let me on the jury.

[Girlene]

Something doesn't jive ~ were charges brought before or after he left Iraq? And was his "equivelant of a grand jury" an Article 32?

That's what I'm wondering. Several of the articles make it sound like he was "tricked" when he was brought back to the US. I'm wondering if NCIS got him to sign a statement, essentially getting him to think it would all be taken care of. Once he signed it, he was brought back, locked up, and facing charges from what he signed. This is all conjecture, of course, but it wouldn't surprise me if it isn't far from the mark.

He's already had his hearing. There was no publicity because the Marines never released any info. Even the Marine spokesman doesnt' know why. He faces a trial in December.

This is the first I'd read that he was taken to the maximum-security section of the brig at Camp Pendleton. I wonder if he is still there and what conditions he's being held under. Remember the Hamdania 8 being held in shackles until enough people protested?

[Marine_Uncle]

Yet another fine Marine serving in harms way getting screwed on the home front. The Jihadist must be eating this *hit up.

[Marine_Uncle]

This crap has gone way to far. Before we know it, these collective group of clowns shall be holding court martials for Soldiers and Marines guilty of looking the wrong way at some scruby bastard they meet on some filthy street during their patrols.

[Girlene]

Lily, pink and All, the Delano family is also asking for letters of encouragement to their son while he's in the brig awaiting trial. His address is:

LCPL Delano Holmes
c/o "Defend Delano"
PO Box 24352
Indianapolis, IN 46224

[pinkpanther111]

Thanks Girlene, I will try to get a card or letter out ASAP!

[4woodenboats]

Thanks Girlene, I will try to get a card or letter out ASAP

Copy that, and it's time I do another dig under the cushions, truck seats & appliances to scare up some pictures of patriots, every one of which are probably weeping in their graves about now.

[Girlene]

Thanks, pink. Whatever you can get out, even just a short note, I’m sure will help a young Marine feel like he’s not been forgotten after all this time. I put one in the mail today since I had a little down time.

[Girlene]

I put a letter in the mail today to LCpl Holmes and am working on a letter to Lt. Gen. Mattis, as well. It can’t hurt.

Digging around for “pictures of patriots”. LOL. 4wb, you are the best!

[lilycicero]

How did I miss this?

Thanks.

[Girlene]

Red, didn't know if you had any follow up on Delano Holmes. Here's an article from Sept. 19 in the San Diego Union Tribune Slaying suspect chose war over recruiting

CAMP PENDLETON – Delano V. Holmes was a scholarship student at Indiana University weighing a career in journalism or law when he joined the Marine Corps as a reservist in 2004.

He so impressed his superiors that upon graduating from the San Diego Marine Corps Recruit Depot they wanted him sign up other young men to fight.

But he chose to go to war, believing he couldn't ask others to do what he had not done himself.

What began as a selfless act to serve his country in a time of war has gone terribly wrong.

The 22-year-old lance corporal is a defendant in a murder case. He's accused of stabbing an Iraqi soldier to death as the two shared guard duty in downtown Fallujah on Dec. 31. If convicted of murdering Mutather Jasem Muhammed Hassin, he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

The two men fought in an elevated watch post after Hassin illuminated their position with a cell phone and then a cigarette, a defense attorney has said.

Fearing the lights would tip off snipers, Holmes gestured to Hassin to stop. A fight broke out when Hassin laughed, the attorney said. Holmes then stabbed Hassin several times with a bayonet when he thought Hassin was going for his rifle.

The attorney also has said that Holmes suffered post traumatic stress because of little sleep and seeing Marines and civilians maimed and killed.

Yesterday, at a preliminary hearing, Holmes sat in a Camp Pendleton courtroom while lawyers sparred over whether autopsy reports and his statements to Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents should be admitted as evidence at his court-martial later this year.

By all rights, Holmes should be home in Indianapolis making plans to marry his fiancee, attending college and going to church, said Jenni Crowley, Holmes' foster mother.

“He keeps thinking he is going to wake up and find out that this was all a dream,” said Crowley from her home in Indianapolis. She is saving her days off so she can attend the trial. “He's in disbelief that this is happening. We all are.”

Crowley, 37, met Holmes in fall 2001 when he entered Ben Davis High School, where she worked with at-risk youth and coached the speech team, which he joined.

A difficult home life led Holmes to move in with Crowley in 2003. The single, white woman became the foster mother of Holmes, who is Hispanic and black.

“Del was a survivor. He took care of himself from an early age,” Crowley said. “He succeeded regardless of what was going on in his life. He was just a compassionate and caring person. He just had a wonderful spirit around him.”

Holmes earned a scholarship for low-income, first-generation college students and entered Indiana University in spring 2003.

But by early 2004, he had decided to join the Marine Corps reserves.

“I had mixed feelings,” Crowley said. “But I thought it would help his confidence and discipline. He was so determined to give back to society and be a part of something bigger than himself.”

After graduating from boot camp in San Diego in August 2004, he went to Camp Pendleton for infantry training.

The Marines saw Holmes – tall, good natured and a skilled speaker – as natural for recruiting duty. But he couldn't do it.

“He said he had a problem recruiting Marines who he knew would be going to war when he had not,” Crowley said.

Holmes trained as a machine gunner, and when he heard the Marines needed them in Iraq, he volunteered. He left in September 2006. Crowley received a few calls and e-mails, both brief and worrisome. She knew he wasn't telling her how bad it was.

Then came some hope: In a call in January he said he was coming home early, but he did not say why.

A Marine called to tell her. Her foster son was in the Camp Pendleton brig pending an investigation.

Crowley, who is trying to legally adopt Holmes, has visited him several times at the brig.

“He told me, 'Mom, all I can say is that I am innocent, and I have to believe that the attorneys will work this out.' ”

[RedRover]

Thanks, girlie! I didn’t have that.

No follow-ups to report, unfortunately.

I spoke to his attorney Steve Cook who said he’d welcome advice from a military law expert. So I went to my go-to-guy, Jim Culp, who said he’s call Cook.

Last I heard from Mrs Crowley, this hadn’t happened yet.

I’m actually supposed to be seeing Culp tomorrow night so I’ll ask him what’s going on.

Jim’s been really busy defending ol’ bighead’s nephew. Maybe this got lost in the shuffle between Baghdad and Dallas-Ft. Worth.

[Girlene]

Thanks, Red.

[Dead Dog]

Had he just stabed him 10 times for smoking, the liberals in the JAG office would never have pressed charges. However, stabbing a probable insurgent..that’s murder.