Posted on 06/22/2006 4:37:19 AM PDT by SE Mom
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. - A lawyer for a sailor charged along with seven Marines with premeditated murder in the shooting death of an Iraqi man called the allegations "shocking" and said his client was innocent.
"Believe me, there are two sides to this story," said Jeremiah Sullivan III, who represents Navy Hospital Corpsman 3rd Class Melson J. Bacos
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Never mind...only the military is convicted before trial in the press.
ping
I'm sure the ACLU will rush to his defense.
Thanks for the ping. Let's hope and pray these allegations are shown to be bogus.
I heard that the prosecution threatened them with the death penalty.
I read that also...
JAG seems to be giving themselves plenty of work, lately.
Has anyone told them this is a WAR?
I have tried to pick up on this story, who witnessed this? Doesn't it seem awfully unusual that all of a sudden there have been a rash of these reports? Sorry, I don't trust these accusations one bit. The terrorists are master manipulators and think nothing of killing anyone to advance their cause.
Defense lawyer claims client is innocent. No kidding.
Under Article 118 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice conviction for premeditated murder can carry the death penalty.
According to the charging documents they're accused of taking a man from his home, shooting him, and planting evidence. That's not acceptable behavior for any serviceman, war or no war.
Your sarcasm is ill-placed. So far we saw one group totally exonerated by the evidence, and in another, there's a lot of evidence a good deal of the charges were made of whole cloth by the terrorists. Since our military makes it possible for you to post your snide comments here, maybe you owe them AT LEAST the benefit of the doubt unless and until guilt is proven.
As others have pointed out, that is the accusation, which is not the same thing as proof. Please see my #12.
The question I haven't seen answered yet is "Who?" Who is making these accusations? Other marines? Iraqi civilians? Who witnessed this "incident"?
Yeah, I read it. OK, it's war. So what? Does that mean that the kind of behavior these Marines are charged with is acceptable? Should we not investigate such incidents, and file charges if warranted? Or should we just ignore them?
I believe Iraqis have accused them of this. Followed by an investigation, followed by charges being filed. What kind of Iraqis and what motivated them, I don't know.
Here's one more question: WHY would the accused have done this? What American soldier(s) wants to pull a wheelchair bound guy from his house, shoot him and then plant evidence to make him look like a bad guy? They are there to fight a war against real bad guys, real terrorists.
There's something rotten in Denmark about this. On its face, it doesn't make any sense.
According the the news conference the investigators questioned a number of different sources, as well as exhuming the body and conducting an autopsy.
The charges are certainly not being ignored.
The pre-mature convictions and the dancing on the accusations by the media, and some on this forum, are loathsome.
The behavior is not acceptable. However, it's not proven (by any means) that they actually did it. Are you going to condemn them anyway?
There is something rotten in Denmark, as well as on Free Republic, that so many are so anxious to believe the terrorists over our own military. We all know (or should know if we're paying attention) that women, children and the disabled are frequently used not only as human shields, but suicide bombers. Some are willing, some are not. Some people need to learn: produce evidence first, then the verdict, not the other way around.
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