Posted on 12/04/2008 5:17:03 PM PST by Virginia Ridgerunner
Blackwater Worldwide guards involved in the deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting of Iraqi civilians could face mandatory 30-year prison sentences under an aggressive anti-drug law being considered as the Justice Department readies indictments, people close to the case said.
Charges could be announced as early as Monday for the shooting, which left 17 civilians dead and strained U.S. relations with the fledgling Iraqi government. Prosecutors have been reviewing a draft indictment and considering manslaughter and assault charges for weeks. A team of prosecutors returned to the grand jury room Thursday and called no witnesses.
Though drugs were not involved in the Blackwater shooting, the Justice Department is pondering the use of a law, passed at the height of the nation's crack epidemic, to prosecute the guards. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 law calls for 30-year prison terms for using machine guns to commit violent crimes of any kind, whether drug-related or not.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
To prosecute, authorities must argue that the guards can be charged under a law meant to cover soldiers and military contractors. Since Blackwater works for the State Department, not the military, it's unclear whether that law applies to its guards.
It would be the first such case of its kind. The Justice Department recently lost a similar case against former Marine Jose Luis Nazario Jr., who was charged in Riverside, Calif., with killing four unarmed Iraqi detainees.
Further complicating the case, the State Department promised several Blackwater guards limited immunity in exchange for their sworn statements shortly after the shooting. Prosecutors will need to show that they did not rely on those statements in building their case.
This is the kind of crap that causes folks to never trust Uncle Sam--now that Blackwater is not needed in Iraq, the involved agents can be sacrificed to appease the Iraqis under what is undoubtedly some type of secret deal with Al Maliki in exchange for the recent security agreement.
Why would anyone EVER want to work as a security contractor for the U.S. government knowing now that it would throw you under the bus at the earliest opportunity.
We have the same problem with our CIA...I heard on fox the other night a guy that wrote a book about the CIA and he said for the past 7 years they have been leaving that organization in droves because they are afraid of being prosecuted criminally for “torture”.
How can we protect this country when the left is the Fifth Column?
But you don’t UNDERSTAND. These drug laws are NEEDED SO BADLY to stop the bad bad dealers. No one would EVER abuse this kind of power! NEVER!
I think your instincts are right-on. Maliki has been pushing long & loud for a prosecution of the Blackwater employees involved in that incident. You can bet there’s been some horse-trading going on here.
Mercenaries are generally disliked by both sides.
Once no longer needed, they are a liability for their former employers.
“to commit violent crimes of any kind”
So defending their client—even if they did so mistakenly—was a CRIME???
This is ridiculous.
The Dept. of Justice (and this case is not the first example of this kind of conduct by the DOJ, by any means) needs to replace the statue of Justice outside its HQ with one of Pontius Pilate washing his hands after he turned over someone innocent in order to placate a mob...
The victory in Iraq will be betrayed by those in Washington
I saw this before when I returned from Viet Nam where we had won total control of the battle field,,
What is it that makes Washington destroy the success we have had on every battle field since WWII??
This application of “law” to a war zone is bogus.
Bush talked tough but now seems to have washed his hands of the warriors who gave his words steel.
we need to be ruled by the warriors , not the civilians
“we need to be ruled by the warriors , not the civilians”
We don’t need to be “ruled” at all.
If I wanted to be ruled I'd move to china.
These men are/were not mercenaries!
roger tango
“A mercenary is a person who takes part in an armed conflict, who is not a national or a party to the conflict, and is “motivated to take part in the hostilities essentially by the desire for private gain and, in fact, is promised, by or on behalf of a party to the conflict, material compensation substantially in excess of that promised or paid to combatants of similar ranks and functions in the armed forces of that Party”
The definitions seem to point to BW being mercenaries.
Wrong! By this definition, these men are not mercenaries.
They are salaried tax-paying employees who provide security solutions to people, companies, and organizations worldwide.
They are NOT participants in any war...nor does Blackwater accept any contracts to fight wars of any kind.
What about bank guards, night watchmen, police officers, intelligence operatives, or any one of the hundreds of types of government employees now under arms?
Try visiting the Moyock, NC training facility and learn some facts rather than repeating the leftist-media b.s....
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