FORT KNOX - An investigating officer Friday recommended the court-martial of a soldier charged in the deadly grenade attack on sleeping 101st Airborne comrades in Kuwait.
My surprise meter reads '0'.
Evidence shows Sgt. Hasan Akbar had ample time to acquire the grenades used in the attack and that Akbar's rifle killed one of the two officers who died, said Col. Patrick Reinert at an Article 32 hearing. "There are reasonable grounds to believe the accused committed the offensive charges," Reinert said. "This was a surprise attack executed by stealth." Fourteen other soldiers were wounded in the March 23 attack days before the 1st Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division was to move into Iraq. Reinert's recommendation will go to Abkar's battalion commander, Lt. Col. Peter DeLuca of the 326th Engineer Battalion, and eventually to Maj. Gen. David Petraeus, commanding general of the 101st. Maj. Trey Cate, 101st spokesman, said he does not know when DeLuca - who is in Iraq - would make a decision.
| It's not a decision that calls for a lot of deliberation, I'd guess. Dead officers, wounded men, traitorous bad guy hiding under something... |
Akbar's attorney said in closing arguments Friday morning that no eyewitnesses placed the soldier at the scene, and that soldiers on the ground unduly assumed he committed the crime because he is Muslim. "Nobody, not one witness, can say they saw Sgt. Akbar throw a grenade or fire a weapon," Lt. Col. Victor Hansen argued. Capt. Harper Cook, an attorney for the prosecution, said Akbar stole seven grenades from a Humvee he was guarding, then an hour later walked to the brigade operations area to attack his comrades in the three tents. "He selected the weapons, he pulled the pins, he threw the grenades and he shot Maj. (Kenneth) Romaine with his rifle," Cook said. Romaine was wounded in both hands and his left thigh by a gunshot in the attack, he testified. Cook said evidence shows Akbar's weapon was used to kill Capt. Army Capt. Christopher Scott Seifert, 27, of Easton, Pa. Air Force Maj. Gregory Stone, 40, of Boise, Idaho, also was killed.
There goes the "nobody saw him do it" argument.
Cook also said Akbar was injured in his leg during the attack, but chose not to seek treatment because he wanted to blend in with other soldiers. His attack plan "was well-thought out and executed with military precision," Cook said.
| Cowardly and underhanded, but executed with military precision. |
Hansen pointed out that two different soldiers testified they told investigators that Akbar was not the man they saw shoot Seifert. One witness said he saw a second shot fired that he thought came from a second shooter. Hansen said the probe was tainted when Col. Ben Hodges, the brigade commander, told the arriving investigator that a soldier had confessed to the crime because he said American soldiers were going to rape and kill Muslims in Iraq. Hansen said soldiers on the ground were too quick to assume that Akbar committed the crime because he is Muslim and that Hodges was not a criminal investigator and should not have been making assumptions. "Now we'll never know" what really happened, Hansen said.
Oh, I think we do.
Hodges testified by video teleconference from Mosul, Iraq, on Thursday that two Kuwaiti interpreters were detained immediately after the attack, but soon he received word that Akbar and grenades he had been guarding could not be accounted for. "By the time the sun's coming up, I was pretty well convinced it was one of our soldiers," said Hodges, who suffered shrapnel wounds in his arm in the attack. Akbar, 32, did not testify. He could face the death penalty if convicted at a court-martial. It is the first time since the Vietnam War that a U.S. Army soldier has been prosecuted for the murder or attempted murder of another soldier during a period of war, the Army said.
If all the defense has to offer is "no one saw him" and "everyone is a bigot", it's going to be a mighty short trial. |