"Context" does not excuse this atrocity. Seems like they are just trying to get him not the death penalty here. One of Abeer's brothers testified yesterday. I want his superiors held responsible also. No excuses.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iYeOUInDxFuT4T8CsYG9-_KfQ9pgD97R4QE01An ex-soldier charged with raping and killing a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and slaying her family set the girl's body ablaze after shooting her several times, prosecutors said Monday during opening statements at his federal trial.
Steven Dale Green, 23, of Midland, Texas, faces more than a dozen charges, including sexual assault and four counts of murder, stemming from the March 2006 attack in Iraq's so-called "Triangle of Death." After he shot the girl in the face several times, Green used kerosene to set fire to her body, Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Skaret said. "They left behind the carnage of all carnage," Skaret said of Green and other soldiers accused in the March 12, 2006, attack.
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Later Monday, jurors heard two relatives testify about the carnage inside the victims' home. They also were shown photographs of the teen's burned body.
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Later, Green talked about the killings to superior officers, other soldiers and even civilian friends, Skaret said. In Green's defense, attorney Patrick Bouldin painted a picture of young soldiers in harsh wartime conditions, lacking leadership and receiving little help from the Army to deal with the loss of friends. He said Green lost five colleagues in combat prior to the attack. A federal public defender, Bouldin showed jurors a videotape of Green speaking at a memorial service for two slain sergeants. He said soldiers had lost so many friends and leaders they could no longer perform their duties.
"Context," Bouldin said. "You've got to understand the context."...
There has been arguments that he should be tried NOT in a civilian court, here is why...
http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20090426/NEWS01/904260415/1008/NEWS01/Prosecutors+want+arguments+barred+in+ex-soldier+s+trial...
But lawyers for Green, who goes on trial tomorrow in Paducah, said the jury should know that he would have faced lesser sentences in a court-martial and that he would have been eligible for parole....
RIP Abeer, Hadeel, Fakhria, Qaseem
http://uk.reuters.com/article/gc05/idUKTRE53R07N20090428A former U.S. soldier on trial in the gang rape of an Iraqi girl and the murder of her and her family in the war zone in 2006 was caught in a "perfect storm of insanity," his lawyer told a jury on Monday.
But government prosecutors in the same courtroom said former Private 1st Class Steven Green, alleged ringleader of the slayings, was only interested in killing Iraqis "nonstop" and bragged during a barbecue celebration later that what he had done was "awesome."
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After the crime, Skaret said, the men celebrated with a barbecue, and Green was said to have commented "that was awesome." He also told an Army investigator the day after, "I did that. I killed them," Skaret said.
The family was chosen because the soldiers viewed them as an easy target, prosecutors have said....
http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20090427/NEWS01/904280301/1008/Trial+begins+in+former+soldier+s+murder+trialA federal prosecutor today told a jury that the government will prove that former soldier Steven Green raped a 14-year-old girl and then murdered her and her family “not in the fog of war, but in cold blood.”
In an opening statement in a trial that is expected to last three to five weeks, Justice Department lawyer Brian Skaret said the government will present at least five witnesses who say Green bragged about the crimes, including one who says Green told his fellow soldiers that it was “awesome.”
In his hour-long opening remarks, Green’ s co-counsel didn’t dispute his role in the crimes or that they were a “horrible tragedy” for the family of Abeer Al-Janabi, the girl who was raped and shot in the face before her body was set afire.
But federal public defender Patrick Bouldin asked the jury to consider the context for that tragedy — what he called “a perfect storm of craziness” in which four of Green’s fellow soldiers, including three of his leaders, were murdered in 12 days....
http://www.theleafchronicle.com/article/20090428/NEWS01/90428019A former U.S. Army soldier accused of raping and killing a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and slaying her family was upset after losing several friends in combat but didn't appear to struggle more than anyone else in his unit, one of his commanding officers testified.
Steven Dale Green, 23, of Midland, Texas, has pleaded not guilty to more than a dozen charges, including sexual assault and four counts of murder, stemming from the March 2006 attack in Iraq's so-called "Triangle of Death." He is being tried in federal court in connection with the girl's rape and killing and the deaths of her mother, father and a 6-year-old sister.
Col. Todd Ebel told jurors on Monday, the opening day of trial, that he spoke with Green in December 2005 about losing soldiers to enemy attacks. But, Ebel said, beyond frustration, the private first class with the 101st Airborne Division didn't appear unfit to remain in the Army....
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