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| Iraq-Jordan |
| Marine 'hostage' to be charged with desertion |
| 2004-12-09 |
| I was wondering whatever happened to this guy: A U.S. Marine who disappeared in Iraq and then showed up in a purported hostage video before later appearing as a free man in Lebanon, is being charged with desertion, Pentagon officials said Thursday. Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun will also be charged by the Marine Corps with larceny and wrongful disposition of military property in connection with his service-issued 9 mm handgun that disappeared with him and never turned up, officials said. When Hassoun last spoke with military investigators in September and was read his rights, he refused to divulge details of the events surrounding his disappearance. The 24-year-old from West Jordan, Utah, will not be held in custody, because he is not considered a flight risk, officials said. [...] Um, I wouldn't be too sure about that. Military investigators re-opened the Hassoun case last month after several personal items -- including his military ID and civilian passport -- were found in Falluja, the city from which he disappeared in June. "The circumstances of his alleged capture and subsequent return to military control are still being investigated," the Marines said in a statement. Hassoun reappeared July 7 in Lebanon, where he was born and has relatives. What happened to Hassoun is a mystery to military investigators. After the initial report that Hassoun was missing, military officials assumed he had walked away from camp. He was listed as a deserter. His status was changed to captured after the release of a videotape that showed him blindfolded with a sword suspended above his head. A few days later, a posting to three Islamist Web sites claimed Hassoun had been beheaded. Hassoun denied being a deserter and staging his own kidnapping. [...] Whatever the outcome of the investigation, this dude can't be trusted now. |
| Posted by:Rafael |
| #6 He feels it's more important to be a good moose limb than a Marine. Not a problem you can be a moose limb in federal pound me in the ass prison for 20 years. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2004-12-09 9:37:28 PM |
| #5 I was just wondering what this will do to those who hyphenate themselves as Arab-Americans in the military who are doing their jobs. Those who know them personally, won't even think about it - I never even thought to connect such dots about someone who was covering my ass and doing a bang-up job of it, but others who don't know them may begin to doubt them, keep them out of sensitive areas or fights - marginalize them. And that sucks. Good people. Bad people. Screw the other damned bullshit labels. We used to laugh that we didn't care if someone was a green-haired middle-armed trisexual from Mars - the only question was if they could cut it... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-12-09 9:29:32 PM |
| #4 .com - spot on. I knew in my gut as soon as this came out that this guy went over the hill. "When Hassoun last spoke with military investigators in September and was read his rights, he refused to divulge details of the events surrounding his disappearance." -I've been the investigating officer into a number of cases of weird shit, usually pleading the fifth to investigators is a dead giveaway that you're guilty. |
| Posted by: Jarhead 2004-12-09 9:18:35 PM |
| #3 Correct! I was floored when this had happened and he will get what is coming to him- or what goes around comes around. Andrea Jackson |
| Posted by: Andrea Jackson 2004-12-09 8:54:09 PM |
| #2 Hope he likes snow, cause I hear they get a lot of it at Leavenworth. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2004-12-09 8:33:38 PM |
| #1 "When Hassoun last spoke with military investigators in September and was read his rights, he refused to divulge details of the events surrounding his disappearance." Ah, the first confirmation (I've seen) of that as a fact. Yep. Lock his ass up and toss the key. The whole thing stank like a festering jihadi before - and now it deserves the hobnail boots. I'm pretty sure they won't execute him, but it would not cause me to lose sleep if they went that route. Big rocks meet little rocks. Fuck off Hussein, you're a disgrace to the uniform and to the real Americans who do their duty. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-12-09 8:23:18 PM |