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Attorneys: Accused troops won't testify against each other

By: MARK WALKER - Staff Writer

CAMP PENDLETON -- Seven Marines and a Navy corpsman charged in the April killing of an Iraqi man are refusing to testify against one another, attorneys for one of the men said Monday.

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Jane Siegel, who represents Pfc. John Jodka III, said the military was increasingly frustrated that none would agree to testify for the prosecution.

"The government is doing its damned best to try and provoke one of these Marines to testify against the others in accordance with its theory of the case," Siegel said. "None of these men are going to do that."

Siegel's comments were made after the Marine Corps sent the attorneys a notice Friday afternoon saying that it was ready to proceed with hearings Aug. 1 to determine if the premeditated murder, conspiracy, kidnapping and related offenses will stand.

In the notice, the Marine Corps said that it intended to call each man as a witness to testify against his squad mates in the alleged premeditated kidnapping and murder of 52-year-old Hashim Ibrahim Awad on April 26 in Hamdania, Iraq.

Seigel's co-counsel, Joseph Casas, said the notification of the government's intention is part of its legal strategy. Once Jodka or the other men invoke the military equivalent of their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, that opens the door for prosecutors to use hearsay statements each may have made.

"I'm not very surprised by that maneuver," said Casas, who spent time as a military prosecutor while in the Navy.

Marine Corps officials had no immediate response to the attorneys' comments.

The notice was sent in part to preserve the government's requirement to move the case along its judicial process within 120 days of the men's first being incarcerated, which was May 10, in Fallujah, Iraq. The men were transferred to Camp Pendleton later that month and have been in the base brig since May 24.

Defense attorneys are asking the military to postpone the investigative hearings until mid-September. That request was filed Monday, and the attorneys said they expect it will be granted.

The defense lawyers also complain that the Marine Corps continues to decline requests for evidence they say they need to prepare for the hearings and any subsequent courts-martial.

Casas said the denials cite the same reason ---- the requests are premature because the case has not been bound over for trial.

On Monday, Casas said the Marine Corps denied his request to bring in a crime scene reconstructionist.

Last week, the Marine Corps said that it would be premature to have an independent investigator appointed for the defense and to allow that investigator to travel to Iraq to see the site where the incident occurred.

Those denials are particularly frustrating, Casas said, because "we've got one of the largest and most serious cases that the Marine Corps has seen since Vietnam."

The military also has identified additional prosecutors assigned to the case as Lt. Col. John Baker, listed as senior trial counsel, along with Majs. Don Plowman and Daren Erickson and Capt. Nick Gannon. The Marine Corps previously named Lt. Col. Sean Sullivan and Capt. Timothy Garrison as prosecutors assigned to the case.

-- Contact staff writer Mark Walker at (760) 740-3529 or mlwalker@nctimes.com.

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http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2006/07/25/news/top_stories/8_04_547_24_06.txt