-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: June 8, 2007 6:53:45 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Bush's War in Iraq: "Put on a Happy Face"
Marine says he was given orders to erase photos of Haditha victims
first evidence military engaged in a coverup in the murder of 24
Iraqi civilians
By Tony Perry
LA Times, June 8, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-
haditha8jun08,0,317727.story
"I expected Haditha to be another Falluja."
— Lt. Mark Towers, Battalion adjutant
CAMP PENDLETON — A staff sergeant testified Thursday that he was
ordered to destroy grisly pictures of women and children killed by
Marines so that the images would not be part of a statement being
prepared for an investigative officer and a magazine reporter.
The testimony by Staff Sgt. Justin Laughner, taken under a grant of
immunity, is the first evidence suggesting that any Marine officer
may have engaged in a coverup in the deaths of 24 Iraqi civilians
in 2005.
Other testimony has suggested that officers made only a superficial
review before deciding that the deaths were combat-related and thus
no war crimes investigation was required.
At the Article 32 inquiry, similar to a preliminary hearing for a
former battalion commander, Laughner testified hat he felt the
order to destroy the pictures, which he said was given by Lt.
Andrew Grayson, amounted to obstruction of justice but that he
complied and later lied when asked whether any pictures had been
taken.
"It was wrong," Laughner said. "Somebody was asking for them [the
pictures], and we're not going to give them to them? It's not
right, but I didn't say anything."
Although Laughner deleted the pictures from his computer, the
images remained on his digital camera and are now part of the
criminal case against four officers and three enlisted Marines.
Grayson is charged with dereliction of duty and obstruction of
justice in the aftermath of the killings, which occurred in the
Iraqi town of Haditha on Nov. 19, 2005. The three other officers —
including the former commander of the Marine battalion involved,
Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani — are charged with dereliction of duty
for not calling for a war-crimes investigation.
At the inquiry on Chessani's conduct, Laughner said that he had no
evidence the lieutenant colonel ever saw the photographs or knew of
their existence.
Laughner had taken the pictures in the hours after the killings.
Three months later, when he and Grayson were preparing a statement
for high-ranking officers and a Time magazine reporter, Grayson
told him to delete the pictures, Laughner testified Thursday.
The statement they prepared reiterated the Marines' official
position that the deaths were the result of crossfire after Marines
were attacked by insurgents. Laughner and Grayson were part of an
intelligence team assigned to work with the 3rd Battalion, 1st
Marine Regiment, in Haditha.
Team members interview civilians and, among other things, review
the scene of civilian deaths to gather information that can be
helpful to Marines.
Laughner arrived several hours after a roadside bomb had killed a
Marine from the battalion's Kilo Company. After that blast, Marines
killed five young men outside their car and, after being ordered to
search for insurgents in nearby houses, killed 19 civilians.
Laughner testified that Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, who led the
troops involved in the shootings, told him that the men in the car
had "engaged" the Marines with weapons, that Marines encountered an
insurgent firing at them in one house, and that AK-47s were found
in the houses. Prosecutors say all three assertions are lies.
Laughner said Wuterich did not tell him that the Marines had killed
women and children in the houses. But when Laughner went to the
houses to look for evidence of insurgents, he found instead a young
girl who was in hysterics.
He said that his interpreter told him what the girl was screaming:
"She said the Marines came into her house and killed her family,"
Laughner said.
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