New revelations!: The Case Against the Haditha Defendants is Coming Unglued

Defend Our Marines ^ | July 25, 2007 | Nathaniel R. Helms

[AliVeritas]

About time. We knew about the predator how soon after it happened? Sheesh. Excellent post Red.

Has anyone touched on the morgue angle yet?

[Chickenhawk Warmonger]

Damn good news Red! Any reports from the closing statements today?

[Son House]

http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Page=/Nation/archive/200707/NAT20070713b.html

“Our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them, and they killed innocent civilians in cold blood,” Murtha said, before calling for U.S. troops to be “redeployed” out of the country.

POS, and I don’t mean the ‘+’ post on a battery.

.
Bush should pardon our Marines from this non-sense, and politicians better be prepared for ruthless bombing of enemy countries so no American Troops ever have to endure the Rep John Murtha (D-Pa.) types.

[RedRover]

I actually feel some sympathy for Mendoza. I know he chose his own destruction as a Marine, but he never would have been put in that position without this prosecution.

The scuttlebutt is also that Mendoza has an illegal alien wife who was threatened with immediate deportation if he didn't play ball.

[jazusamo]

It’s evident to me at this point in the hearings that much of what has come out in these hearings wasn’t turned over to the defense in a timely manner.

IMO it has been that some of the evidence was classified but should have been made available to the defense, some of the NCIS investigators were and are inept and/or biased and lastly the prosecution is guilty of misconduct. All three reasons should be enough to dismiss all charges against all these Marines.

I agree that Winter and Walker should be fired and that a full investigation of the NCIS be conducted.

[Citizen Tom Paine]

To a vet, this is disgusting. The Marines are sacrificing their own on the alter of PC (it looks like). Consider what these Marines went through and are going through. Murtha should be censured and removed from Congress.

[Girlene]

Good point about COl. Sokoloski. I’m also wondering how Gen. Huck feels about his testimony during Chessani’s hearing? The predator may not have been aloft when the civilians were killed in those houses, but it and the Scan Eagle make it obvious the insurgents were spreading out and taking on the Marines elsewhere. The Haditha “incident” was not an isolated engagement. It was part of a full day of combat.

[brityank]

But President Bush's DOJ apparently thinks otherwise.

Mr. Bush's DOJ is constitutionally wrong:

Article I Section. 6.
The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States.
They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.
No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office.

Murtha's statements were made, not only on the Floor of the House, but in a public venue both before and after his Floor speeches. Also notice that "Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace" ARE causes for arrest on the Floor.

[shield]

Oh my...

[aruanan]

If NCIS, or any other government agency, is somehow cooking the facts for the sake of politics, I say we are in deep shit.

When are they not cooking the facts for the sake of politics?

[freema]

Hell yeah, ping.

[RedRover]

The morgue angle came up in this hearing though it wasn't reported at all in the media. The Iraqi hospital reports did not match the determinations of the prosecution's pathology experts. It was pretty farcical (in a horrendously grim kind of way).

Granted, prosecution experts based their determinations about causes of death on photographs so it wasn't two conclusions based on the same evidence. But it showed that prosecuting Marines for murder when no one really knows how the "victims" died is ridiculous.

[Chickenhawk Warmonger]

Anybody up for some serious debunking?

From Newshounds...
“He cited as one of his examples the mainstream media’s reporting on Haditha. Last I checked, the media got it right about that. But Bozell didn’t elaborate and Hannity didn’t ask.”

http://www.tiny.cc/pgMHD

[caisson71]

Like much of the news today, we don’t read/hear about all that is going right with many government agencies. I believe - and that is all I can do - that there are many honest and hard working people in gov’t agencies doing excellent work for this country, keeping us safe and promoting the betterment for all. It’s the “dirty dishes” we see and smell.

[Ben Chad]

All of this makes me sick.

You aren't the only one.

[Shelayne]

Saaay Whaaat?? **bug-eyed bewilderment**

An officer who was there said so many people were watching the fight go down that a faraway Public Affairs Officer wrote 3/1 to suggest it was time to “maximize the coalition coverage of this, pointing out to the locals that insurgents don't care about their children."

They have VIDEO of this!! Remind me again why these men were charged??

And this:

On December 18, 2005, three days before three Marines from his squad were charged with murder Mendoza was granted immunityfrom prosecution in return for his cooperation. Despite previous testimony to the contrary Mendoza went from being part of a combat stack of Marines attacking a hostile objective to a lone Marine apparently wandering around in a smoke-filled house grenades had just been thrown into, he testified.

This story has so many holes, swiss cheese would blush.

Oh, and finally this nugget:

“[It]… finishes with the insurgent holding a child in order to avoid getting bombed again,” he added, “before we swarmed in to capture him.”

Uhhh, wouldn't this be a smoking gun?? If I were the judge, it would be "Dismissed, WITH prejudice!" thwap, thwap, thwap (my gavel). Oh and then,"Now bring me Tim McGirk and John Murtha!" thwap, thwap, thwap. (Obviously more a civilian court fantasy.)

This has gone from being just "hinky" to a total farce of a prosecution. What on EARTH is going on here??

[Shelayne]

I don't know where, but I firmly recall Conlin stating that "in his opinion" that Chessani should have been out in the field instead of "looking at grainy images at the CP".

Yes, that statement is bugging me. Wouldn't Conlin actually be AWARE of the technology capabilities of the Scan Eagle? And if he was, why would he spout off something so ridiculous, on its face?

[RedRover]

It's taken all this time to come out because NCIS investigators ignored any evidence that was exculpatory. You may remember that the Article 32s were delayed a month from their original commencement dates. Prosecutors were made aware of the existence of this evidence months after charges were filed against the Marines.

Also, portions of this evidence were only recently declassified and are still being kept largely under wraps. Understandably, no one is eager to let the enemy know just how we monitor them.

[RedRover]

You raise a very important point. The "grainy images" that Conlin referred to were the result of compressed images. As has come to light, Conlin was not shown the video in its original state. The version he saw had degraded image quality to save on storage space and download time. That's what gave the impression of "grainy images".

[brityank]

Wouldn't Conlin actually be AWARE of the technology capabilities of the Scan Eagle?

Probably not.
Recall that Conlin was in Iraq in 2003, and they didn't have division-level flying eyes until 2005, and the newer ones didn't arrive until then either. He based his wrong-headed opinion on only what he had experienced, not on what he should have learned in the Leadership Training Continuing Ed courses he should have had. He, and the rest of the Rear Echelon Military Fakes need to take some remedial Operations courses and see what the real Marines are doing today, not what they were doing three years ago.