EUR: US soldier gets life for murder of prisoners in Iraq
17 Apr 2009 12:40 AM
VILSECK, Germany, April 16 AFP - A senior US soldier has been jailed for life for the murder of four bound and blindfolded prisoners in Iraq, a court martial in Germany says.
US Master Sergeant John Hatley was also found guilty on Wednesday of conspiracy to kill the unidentified detainees, but was acquitted of a fifth charge of premeditated murder and of obstruction of justice.
He will be eligible for parole in 20 years, Hatley's defence lawyer David Court said on Thursday.
During the sentencing hearing, 40-year-old Hatley told an eight-man army panel that he respected their findings but recounted the stress of dealing with mounting American casualties at the hands of insurgents.
"I understand your decision," he said.
"I'm not perfect, I ain't no angel" the sergeant said, fighting back tears as he spoke of cleaning or "policing up the pieces of our soldiers" and friends following bomb and sniper attacks.
Court said Hatley had taken the sentence "stoically".
The defendant had expressed no emotion when the verdict was announced late on Wednesday, but embraced his wife and fellow soldiers and friends who had stood by him during the four-day trial.
Hatley had been accused of shooting prisoners in two separate incidents but was declared not guilty of the January 2007 death of a detainee who was already seriously wounded.
The second shooting -- of four blindfolded prisoners -- took place in late March in or near southwest Baghdad.
Hatley was the highest ranking of three soldiers tried for killing the prisoners, who were shot "execution style," according to army prosecutors.
The bodies, which witnesses said were dumped into a canal, were never found.
The trial was held near this southeastern German town because Hatley's unit has redeployed to Germany.
