Cpl. Jerry E. Shumate Jr. Posted on 09/12/2006 1:22:43 PM PDT by radar101
Cpl. Jerry E. Shumate Jr.
CAMP PENDLETON ---- A trio of Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents testified Tuesday morning about how they went about interrogating a Marine lance corporal and other members of a Camp Pendleton platoon accused of killing an Iraqi man earlier this year.
The pretrial hearing for Lance Cpl. Jerry E. Shumate Jr. lasted a little more than an hour but did not reveal much of the substance of the prosecution's case against the seven Marines and Navy corpsman from the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment.
The troops are accused of killing 52-year-old Hashim Ibrahim Awad in the Iraqi village of Hamdania on April 26.
At the conclusion of the hearing, Lt. Col. John Baker announced the prosecution did not intend to seek the death penalty against Shumate, a 21-year-old infantryman from Matlock, Wash.
The prosecutors and defense were given until Thursday to submit written closing arguments to hearing officer Col. Robert S. Chester.
After announcing that he would consider Shumate's case based on 39 investigative reports, Chester said the only testimony this morning would come from Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents.
The first to testify was Kelly Garbo, a 25-year-old agent who described how she and other agents interviewed the accused men at Camp Fallujah on May 11.
The agent said Shumate was the second Marine the investigators interviewed. The first was Lance Cpl. Tyler Jackson, whom the agent said drew a map diagramming how the alleged kidnapping and killing occurred.
Garbo testified that she told Shumate that other members of his unit had told investigators that "there was indeed a kidnap and a murder."
At one point during the interview, the agent testified, Shumate became emotional.
"He was fairly calm and partly through the interview he started to get emotional," the agent said. "Then he was calm. Then toward the end he started to get emotional again ---- he was crying."
Last week, Shumate's attorney, Steven Immel, said he expected the hearing would last two days.
But Chester told the courtroom that Immel's attorney had changed his mind on hearing from all those witnesses based on "pretrial publicity in the case that would hinder your (Shumate's) opportunity" to get a fair trial.
Chester also told Shumate that he declined a request from his attorney to close the courtroom session to the public.
Before the session began ---- more than an hour behind schedule ---- Shumate's family was already seated in the front row of the military courtroom. His parents, Diann and Jerry Shumate, made the 1,200-mile drive last week with their adult daughter, Amanda, from Matlock.
When the family entered the courtroom, they greeted the defendant with smiles and showed him pictures on a camera phone.
Shumate's father wore a T-shirt with the phrase: "My son, one of the few, the proud, a Marine."
The hearing was the third in a string of court sessions for the eight accused men. Today's proceedings were expected to provide the most insight thus far into the government's case in the Awad killing ---- until Chester announced that Immel had changed his mind.
On Aug. 31, attorneys for Cpl. Marshall Magincalda and Pfc. John Jodka III took the same route as Immel, stopping their client's Article 32 hearings in the Awad incident just as they were getting started by convincing prosecutors and hearing officers to agree to no direct testimony. Instead, the attorneys said they would let the hearing officers determine how their clients' cases should proceed.
Marine Corps officials said Tuesday that the reports from the Magincalda and Jodka hearings have been submitted to the base's top legal officer for review and recommendation to Lt. Gen. James Mattis.
The government alleges the accused men conspired to kidnap and kill Awad, 52, and then staged the killing scene to make it appear he was an insurgent planting a roadside bomb who had fired upon the squad as it patrolled the village.
Shumate is specifically alleged to have been one of the men who shot Awad with his M-16 rifle and later lied to investigators about what happened.
Immel said last week that Shumate, a 21-year-old infantryman who joined the Marine Corps in February 2005 and was on his first assignment to Iraq, is not guilty.
In addition to Shumate, Jodka and Magincalda, the Marine Corps on June 21 charged Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins III, Hospitalman 3rd Class Melson Bacos, Cpl. Trent Thomas and Lance Cpls. Jackson and Robert Pennington with premeditated murder, kidnapping, conspiracy and related offenses in Awad's death.
If convicted of the crimes, it could bring the death penalty for the accused men. But at the end of Jodka's court session, prosecutors said they do not intend to seek the death penalty against the 20-year-old Encinitas native, the lowest-ranking and least experienced of the defendants.
Although the same announcement was made for Shumate, prosecutors have not said anything about their intentions if Magincalda is convicted.
Shumate, Hutchins, Thomas and Lance Cpls. Saul Lopezromo and Henry Lever and Pfc. Derek Lewis also are accused of beating an Iraqi man in an unrelated incident in Hamdania on April 10. Also charged in the assault case is platoon 2nd Lt. Nathan Phan, the only officer charged in either case.
Lt. Col. Sean Gibson said that Phan's case will go to an Article 32 hearing at a date to be determined. The cases against Lopezromo, Lever and Lewis will be handled by a less formal process under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, he said.
Pretrial hearings for Bacos and Pennington in the homicide case are scheduled for Sept. 25 while the hearings for Hutchins, Jackson and Thomas are set for Oct. 16, although Marine Corps officials caution that any or all could be rescheduled.
Mattis will issue a decision based on each hearing officer's report. He could order their cases to move forward to court-martial, be dismissed or be subject to some other form of adjudication.
Mattis also will help decide their punishment if any or all are convicted.
Contact staff writer Mark Walker at (760) 740-3529 or mlwalker@nctimes.com. Contact staff writer Teri Figueroa at (760) 631-6624 or tfigueroa@nctimes.com.
Journalists wait in the Camp Pendleton media room where closed-circuit TV monitors show the courtroom, before the hearing began Tuesday.
OH, Yeah, a lot of experience there.
The pretrial hearing for Lance Cpl. Jerry E. Shumate Jr. lasted a little more than an hour but did not reveal much of the substance of the prosecution's case against the seven Marines and Navy corpsman from the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment.
From my experience, The prosecutor doesn't have anything. If he did, he would parade it before the Media.
I'll bet that in 5-10 years they'll be running as Democrats as "war veterans"....
REMF.....
just thanks for getting my blood pressure up.... I really needed that.
Update
One of my marines is over at Pendleton right now on training. I will have to ask him what he thinks. Of course they are trying to drown him out there, so he may have no insight at all, but I will ask.
Hope he does well!
He's doing ok so far, but his platoon was practing with the amtracks and had a bilge pump go out. He wasn't a happy camper then.
We hired another marine from the Marines 4 Life program. He started a week ago and is doing really well. :-)
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