Haditha deaths came on day of chaotic battle
North County Times, June 13, 2007
CAMP PENDLETON -- The day 24 civilians died at the hands of a group of Camp Pendleton Marines in 2005, Haditha was racked by insurgent attacks, making the city a chaotic battleground, a sergeant testified Wednesday.
The witness, Sgt. Frank Wolf, said the attacks that occurred on Nov. 19, 2005, reminded him of the battle for the city of Fallujah in fall 2004, one of the major battles of the Iraq war.
Wolf's testimony came on the third day of a hearing for Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt, one of three enlisted men from Camp Pendleton's 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment charged with murder in the civilian deaths. The pretrial hearing will help decide if Sharratt should be court-martialed.
Sharratt is accused of killing three brothers inside the bedroom of one of four homes the Marines stormed after a roadside bomb killed a Marine and injured two others.
"It was definitely a hostile environment," Wolf testified. "I would put that day up there with Fallujah -- every guy being sent out was being hit with IEDs or small-arms fire."
Wolf was a platoon leader in the battalion, and served with the 22-year-old Sharratt in Fallujah as well as in Haditha, both cities in the volatile Anbar province west of Baghdad. The two participated in numerous house-clearing operations in Fallujah, Wolf said, adding that Sharratt was adept at that task as well as his regular duties.
"As a Marine, I think he is one of the better ones out there," Wolf said.
After the hearing, Lt. Col. Paul Ware will write a recommendation stating whether he believes the evidence warrants ordering Sharratt to stand trial on three counts of unpremeditated murder. That decision ultimately will be made by Lt. Gen. James Mattis as commander of Camp Pendleton's I Marine Expeditionary Force.
Nineteen Iraqis, including several women and children, died inside their homes on the day of the Haditha shootings. Five other Iraqi men were shot when they emerged from a car that drove up immediately after the bombing.
Sharratt's attorneys maintain he was acting in self-defense after being ordered to clear the last of the four homes the Marines assaulted. The shootings took place when he encountered an Iraqi man inside the bedroom holding an AK-47, according to his attorneys.
Relatives of the men slain in the bedroom contend the men were herded into the room and shot in the head in rapid succession. A prosecutor, Capt. Christopher Hur, described the killings in court Wednesday as an "execution."
Those competing accounts -- one that depicts the shooting as self-defense and another as outright slaughter -- are the essence of the Sharratt case and this hearing, which is expected to conclude by the end of the week.
The issue of weapons being seized from the houses also is a point of contention in the Haditha prosecutions. A lance corporal testified Wednesday that he was given two AK-47s that he was told came from two of the homes. Prosecutors, however, maintain there is no firm record of any weapons being seized. AK-47s are ubiquitous in Iraq as each household is allowed to have one.
The man who taught the battalion's troops the rules of engagement, Sgt. Travis Fields, testified that he instructed the Marines to make decisions for themselves in combat situations.
"Don't hesitate," Fields said he taught the Marines prior to the unit being deployed to Haditha in September 2005. "It's a judgement call."
Fields was called to testify by the hearing officer, Lt. Col. Ware, who questioned him at length.
Fields said he told the troops that any time someone was pointing a weapon at a Marine or a Marine believed that they were in imminent danger, the rules of engagement allowed them to shoot, Fields said.
But he said situations such as the one encountered by Sharratt were never specifically addressed.
"They were not trained to anticipate meeting someone inside a home with a weapon," Field said.
Also testifying Wednesday was Lance Cpl. James Prentice, a friend of Sharratt's who served with him in Haditha and spoke briefly with him a few hours after the shootings.
In a statement to investigators in early 2006, Prentice allegedly said Sharratt had told him that he and Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich, the man who led the assault on the homes and is charged with 13 counts of murder, were going to use "a story" that the men inside the room were killed after one pointed a rifle at Sharratt.
But under questioning from defense attorney Jim Culp, Prentice said he never told the investigators that Sharratt had "made up" that story, suggesting those words were inserted into his statement by agents from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
Sharratt's attorneys still haven't decided if he will testify or make a statement at the hearing's conclusion.
Sharratt's father, Darryl Sharratt, said during a break Wednesday that the prosecution of his son is misguided.
"We train these Marines, we send them over to Iraq to kill and then we decide that they did something wrong," he said. "Then we make their fellow Marines testify against them and force Marine lawyers to prosecute them. It's disgusting."
Hearings for Wuterich and the other accused shooter in Haditha, Lance Cpl. Stephen Tatum, are set to take place later this summer.
Hearings for two of four officers charged with dereliction of duty for failing to order an investigation into the civilian deaths have taken place with no decision yet on whether the officers will be ordered to trial. Hearings for the other two officers are also expected to take place later this summer.
Former Marine says Haditha squad was not under fire
The Associated Press, June 14, 2007
CAMP PENDLETON
A squad of Marines that killed 24 Iraqis in Haditha was not receiving insurgent machine-gun fire when they carried out the slayings, a former member of the group testified Thursday.
The claim runs counter to a central argument put forward by three men charged with murder in the killings that they believed they were under attack and responded appropriately.
Trent Graviss was a lance corporal in the squad involved in the Nov. 19, 2005, killings. He recently left active duty and is not charged in the deaths.
"To the best of your knowledge, was there an ambush on your squad?" asked prosecutor Capt. Christian Hur.
"No, sir," replied Graviss, who testified via telephone from his home in Kentucky. He was testifying at the preliminary hearing for Lance Cpl. Justin L. Sharratt, who faces three counts of unpremeditated murder.
The two dozen Iraqis were killed in and around several houses soon after a roadside bomb exploded and killed one Marine. Those charged have maintained the bomb was the start of a coordinated ambush on the U.S. convoy that was followed up with machine-gun fire.
The three men Sharratt is accused of murdering died in one of the homes. Defense attorneys showed photographs of four men who died in that residence. All appeared to have been shot in the head, but several had blood on their torsos, indicating they could have been shot there, too.
Air Force Lt. Col. Elizabeth Rouse, a forensics expert, testified that it did not appear that the men had been killed at close range. Sharratt has acknowledged shooting the men, but said he felt threatened and believed they may have been armed.
The photographs were of poor quality and in at least one picture it was not clear where the bullet entered the victim's head, though blood could be seen pooling in his ear.
Aside from Sharratt, squad leader Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich and Lance Cpl. Stephen B. Tatum are also charged with murder in the killings, the biggest U.S. criminal case of the Iraq war.
A fourth enlisted man, Sgt. Sanick P. Dela Cruz, was initially charged with murder but prosecutors dismissed charges against him. Four officers are charged with dereliction of duty for failing to investigate the killings.
Both Wuterich and Tatum were in the public viewing area of the courtroom Thursday.
During a recess, Wuterich's military attorney Lt. Col. Colby Vokey said he was not concerned about Graviss' testimony, as it is inconsistent to what other witnesses have testified.
"All the other testimony indicates that the Marines were receiving small-arms fire," Vokey said.
Graviss also described the moments immediately after the roadside bomb blast, when he heard Wuterich firing his machine gun. Graviss said he saw a "pink mist in the air where I assumed the people were, it was like a blood spatter in the air." Wuterich is accused of killing 18 people, including five men who were standing by a car.
Graviss said he went with Dela Cruz and an Iraqi soldier to clear a house close to the site of the explosion and detained two or three Iraqis but did not shoot anyone.
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Former Marine is right!