Replies

A judge who knows of a felony has no responsibility to report it?

What about the other people in the trial? Do they?

Heck, if I sent my information to General Casey, would he have a responsibility to report it? Isn’t it always a question of who knew what and when?

And regarding the chain of command, why was anybody looking up the chain of command to see if the Abu Ghraib behaviors were either condoned or commanded higher up the chain of command - if the only link in the chain that matters is the one directly above the behavior in question? Wouldn’t the judge say - as you say any judge would say in Lakin’s case - that the higher links in the chain are absolutely and totally irrelevant and nobody can be allowed to go on a fishing expedition?

"A judge who knows of a felony has no responsibility to report it?"

I can't believe I'm even going to answer this....Do you understand that Misprision of felony requires you to have first-hand knowledge of the felony, or a felonious conspiracy. Whatever Lakin alleges Obama to have done, and whatever evidence he would provide - it would still be an allegation of crime. Could the judge refer such allegations to the appropriate authority - sure. Is he under any kind of legal obligation, probably not. Can he be prosecuted if he is, but still doesn't? No.

"And regarding the chain of command, why was anybody looking up the chain of command to see if the Abu Ghraib behaviors were either condoned or commanded higher up the chain of command - if the only link in the chain that matters is the one directly above the behavior in question? Wouldn’t the judge say - as you say any judge would say in Lakin’s case - that the higher links in the chain are absolutely and totally irrelevant and nobody can be allowed to go on a fishing expedition"

Because the defendants were claiming that they were following orders. No, that doesn't necessarily shield them from criminal liability for their actions, because even if they were ordered to do what they did, they should have known that what they were doing was plainly illegal.

But, if they did receive those orders, then whomever issued those orders was violating the UCMJ and international law, as well. That's why you had an investigation.

The military has no legal authority to investigate the civilian command of the military. The civilians oversee the military, not the other way around.

Sure. Anyone who KNOWS (i.e., has proof) a felony has been committed has an obligation to report it. In fact, one of the viable defenses that an order was unlawful is to demonstrate it was intended to create specific illegal outcomes. To be facetious, if your commanding officer orders you to knock off a 7-11 because he wants to remodel his bathroom, any military judge in existence would find that an unlawful order. Of course, in that extreme case, your commanding officer would probably just knock you off rather than refer it to a court martial after you refused. LOL.

And yes, once illegal activity has been demonstrated, an investigation can and should look up and down the chain of command for culpability. The problem here is that no illegal behavior has been demonstrated. There is no actual proof Obama has done anything illegal; some people feeling certain he has doesn't mean squat legally. And as OldDeckHand has pointed out, Lakin has chosen the wrong vehicle to try and raise the issue. The only issue of interest to his court martial will be his illegal behavior, which he can't defend by claiming someone else might have done something illegal.

The commanding officer at the prison, Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, was demoted to the rank of Colonel on May 5, 2005. Col. Karpinski has denied knowledge of the abuses, claiming that the interrogations were authorized by her superiors and performed by subcontractors, and that she was not even allowed entry into the interrogation rooms.