Legal problems. You can fight the murder charge on the basis that the service member thought he was being attacked by the Iraqi male. Just that is a hard case for gmvt to prove.
Problem is, it is easier to prove the planting of a weapon charge. He did or he didn’t. There is no “self defense” or “thought he was an enemy” defense to the planting a weapon charge.
Once they establish the planting a weapon charge, if they do, then it makes the defense against the murder charge much more difficult, because it is harder to establish that you thought it was a good kill if you thought you had to plant a weapon, etc.
The false official statement and OJ charges are not serious, and probably simply lesser included offenses, but the planting the weapon charge, if sustained, is a problem for what it implies downline
You are correct. This is the key charge. If proven, it will undercut Sgt. Vela's defense of justified homicide.
This is an unusual charge. American troops are not issued soviet-style AK47 rifles, the kind used by insurgents. One has to come up with a source of AK47s for these soldiers who've been charged.
Did they carry around AK47s just for the purpose of planting them? If so, then they were keeping battlefield contraband which is against regs. Carrying them around is unlikely because they'd be punished for it.
The logical conclusion is that these weapons most likely came from the battlefield where the dead men were found.
It's also highly likely that the soldiers who were charged with "planting" weapons were simply assigning to the deceased Iraqis, the weapon they most likely had been using in the fight with the Americans. Given that American troops are debriefed after each operation and they are asked to go over all the details of the battle, then it is likely that they were reconstructing the scene of the fight by putting all the pieces of it together so they could report it back to their unit.