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Defend Our Marines main page  Who’s Behind the Government’s Delay in Bringing the Haditha Case to a Close? Defend Our Marines | Rusty Howell and David Allender [pdf] September 11, 2008 -- It’s fitting that the last remaining defendant in the Haditha case is the squad leader, SSgt Frank Wuterich. Real leaders take responsibility, and SSgt Wuterich has taken full responsibility for the actions of his squad in Haditha. He has also expressed deep remorse for any civilians who were killed as a result of those actions. Over the past 18 months, Wuterich, still waiting to clear his name,...

Defend Our Marines | Nathaniel R. Helms | Thursday, September 4, 2008 [pdf]Riverside, California – A reporter quickly learns that nothing is ever as it seems. That was never more apparent than at the recent US District Court trial of a former Marine acquitted of war crimes that allegedly occured in Fallujah, Iraq almost four years ago. Former sergeant and infantry squad leader Jose L. Nazario was a Riverside Police Department probationary patrolman when he was arrested last year by federal agents and charged in US District Court with killing two enemy prisoners of war. “Was” is the operative word...

Developing story...

Riverside, California--A jury of 12 civilians began deliberations Wednesday afternoon in the case of a former Marine infantry squad leader accused of killing four unarmed insurgents in Fallujah Iraq almost four years ago. Former Sgt. Jose L. Nazario faces federal charges of voluntary manslaughter, abetting murder, assault with a deadly weapon and unlawfully using his firearm. Assistant US Attorney Jerry Behnke took the first shots in closing arguments that began Wednesday morning. Before offering closing arguments, he offered the jury of nine women and three men a surreptitiously recorded telephone conversation between the former squad leader and Sgt. Jermaine Nelson,...

Riverside, California--After two years, countless thousands of dollars and the destruction of far too many reputations, the manslaughter trial of former Marine Corps Sergeant Jose L. Nazario is almost over. Tuesday afternoon at the close of business US District Judge Stephen Larson told the lawyers and spectators in the crowded court room in Riverside that the case against Nazario will go to the jury Thursday morning. From the sound of the things, the news didn’t reach the nine women and three men any too soon. They were already asking Larson when the trial would end, he said. Despite watching the...

Riverside, California--The first witness with personal knowledge of what allegedly happened at Fallujah, Iraq in 2004 is expected to testify today against his former squad leader in US District Court. Former Lance Corporal Corey Carlisle was a Mormon missionary working in Indiana last year when he told a Naval Criminal Investigative Service investigator he heard and saw events that indicated several of his squad mates killed enemy prisoners in the opening hours of the battle. Carlisle told NCIS Special Agent Mark O Fox that his former squad leader Sgt. Jose L. Nazario, his fire team leader Cpl. Ryan Weemer, and...

Riverside, California--The heated atmosphere at the US District Court in Riverside grew even more contentious Friday morning when two Marine sergeants accused of murder by military authorities refused to testify in the manslaughter case of their former squad leader Jose Luis Nazario. The air was already charged with anticipation when sergeants Ryan Weemer and Jermaine Nelson, both 26, marched in ramrod straight to tell US District Judge Stephen Larson that they were refusing to obey his order to testify against their former squad leader. All three men are charged with participating in the execution of four enemy combatants their squad...

Riverside, California--There is a lot at stake in the utilitarian court room dominated by the Seal of the United States District Court for Central California at Riverside. This is where former Marine Corps Sergeant Jose Luis Nazario, 28, is on trial for allegedly killing enemy combatants his squad captured in the opening hours of the battle for Fallujah, Iraq almost four years ago. Two other Marines in the squad he led are charged with unpremeditated murder and dereliction of duty by the Marine Corps. For the record, Nazario says it never happened. On trial with Nazario is almost 250 years...

Wednesday, August 20: Jury selection is complete in the Jose Nazario trial. Fifty-four jurors were pooled, twelve (and two alternates) were chosen. There are nine women and three men on the jury, most have military members in their family and some are veterans. Jose Nazario is happy with the jury selection and confident that justice will be served. Opening statements are scheduled for tomorrow. And so we begin....

Hearing on Iraq detainee death case postponed By Joseph Giordono, Stars and Stripes Mideast edition, Tuesday, August 19, 2008 The Article 32 hearing for one of two U.S. soldiers charged with killing a detainee near Beiji, Iraq, has been postponed until Sept. 5, military officials said. Staff Sgt. Hal M. Warner was originally to face the hearing last week. Warner and 1st Lt. Michael C. Behenna, both members of Company D, 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry Regiment, based in Fort Campbell, Ky., face charges of premeditated murder, accessory after the fact, assault, making a false official statement and obstruction of justice....

Two Camp Pendleton Marines, ordered to testify against former sergeant Jose L. Nazario by the US District Judge presiding over his voluntary manslaughter trial, have decided to refuse the judge’s order. Kevin B. McDermott, the Orange County attorney representing Nazario, says he received the news this morning. “It shows the solidarity of these Marines,” McDermott says. Nazario is charged with two counts of voluntary manslaughter for allegedly executing two captured enemy combatants, compelling his subordinates to assist him in killing two others, and unlawfully using a firearm--his M-16 rifle--in the commission of the crime. Weemer and Nelson face general court-martials...

Government prosecutors, who filed an application in US District Court for an order compelling two Marines co-defendants to testify against their former squad leader, revealed that one of them was a government informant. All three men are accused of executing four enemy combatants they captured in the opening hours of the month-long battle of Fallujah in November 2004. Documents filed in the US District Court for Central California August 11 on reveal that Sgt. Jermaine Nelson, a co-defendant in the case against former Marine Jose L. Nazario, tried to trick his former squad leader into admitting the incident occurred. Nazario,...

The Marine Corps is considering the unprecedented step of appointing a reserve lawyer to assist the US Attorney for Central California in prosecuting former Marine Sgt. Jose L. Nazario in US District Court in Riverside, California, Defend Our Marines has learned.A Marine Corps spokesman at Headquarters Marine Corps in Washington, D.C. confirmed Thursday that a request for an SJA to assist in the prosecution of Nazario was received at HQMC from the US Attorneys Office for Central California. Nazario was indicted by a federal Grand Jury last August 17 for allegedly executing two prisoners of war at Fallujah. In a...

by Nathaniel R. Helms | August 12, 2008 | See the original article in The Hill at the link.Pennsylvania Congressman John Murtha’s press secretary Matt Mazonkey may not have much to say about his boss slandering Marines who fought at Haditha, but he sure is cute, according to a political newspaper that put him on its annual 50 Most Beautiful list. The newspaper, The Hill, named Mazonkey a runner-up in its annual beauty contest. Until his recent honor, Mazonkey was best known for refusing to answer any questions about Rep. Murtha’s inflammatory comments that led to the prosecution of eight...

Major Bill Donahue (USMC, retired) has a personal stake in the Third Battle of Fallujah. He lost a son in that city (a second son lost both legs a month later in Iraq). Now Donahue heads United American Patriots, a national non-profit 501(c) 3 organization and its Warrior Fund project. His mission is to ensure justice for soldiers and Marines accused of crimes arising out of combat in Iraq. Donahue speaks with passion about his cause. And he speaks with understandable pride about his successes. Donations from Warrior Fund were crucial to the recent exonerations of Sgt. Leonardo Treviño and...

CAMP PENDLETON ---- The Marine Corps is going to battle with CBS in what could become a prominent First Amendment case stemming from one of the highest-profile incidents arising out of the Iraq war. At issue is whether government prosecutors should have access to outtakes from a "60 Minutes" interview of a Marine who in 2005 led his squad in the killing of 24 Iraqi civilians, including several women and children. Legal experts and media advocates say the chances of the Marine Corps prevailing over the revered media giant are slim. Several news organizations have joined CBS in its fight...

A Navy Cross recipient is among the Marine veterans of the Battle of Fallujah getting subpoenaed to a US District Court in Riverside, California where former comrade-in-arms Jose L Nazario is scheduled to go on trial for allegedly executing two captured enemy combatants in the opening hours of the battle. When the battle erupted on November 9, 2004 Nazario was an infantry squad leader in 3rd Platoon, Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines – the Thundering Third. He is scheduled to go on trial Aug 19 for voluntary manslaughter and related charges after allegedly killing two insurgents and ordering Marines...

Marine Corps prosecutors have asked a military appeals court to reverse a lower court decision to dismiss criminal charges against the highest ranking officer to face criminal charges in the so-called “Haditha Massacre” affair. The incident occurred on November 19, 2005 at Haditha, Iraq after one Marine was killed and two others from a squad of 12 infantrymen were wounded by a remotely detonated roadside bomb. During the Marines’ counterattack against the hidden assailants 24 Iraqis, including 15 civilians, were killed in the cross-fire. The government seeks to reinstate criminal charges of dereliction of duty and orders violations against...

Bob Weimann | July 25, 2008 | Pdf version______________________________________________________ “For as long as men and women have talked about war, they have talked about it in terms of right and wrong. And for almost as long, some among them have derided such talk, called it a charade, insisted that war lies beyond (or beneath) moral judgment. War is a world apart, where life itself is at stake, where human nature is reduced to its elemental forms, where self-interest and necessity prevail. Here men and women do what they must to save their selves and their communities, and morality and law...

Breaking news!Judge recomends dismissal of manslaughter charges in Sgt John Winnick case. Recommends a minor dereliction charge with nonjudicial punishment. This is a developing story. Check back with Defend Our Marines for details.