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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings, Torture and Big Money |
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May 22nd,
2008 - Winder GI Exonerated of Iraqi Murder |
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Winder GI Exonerated of
Iraqi Murder By Moni Basu The Atlanta Journal-Constitution May 22, 2008 The Army granted clemency
late Tuesday to a Georgia soldier convicted in the murder of an Iraqi
detainee last year. In a February court-martial,
Christopher Phillip Shore, 26, of Winder was exonerated of murder but found
guilty of aggravated assault, a felony charge. But Tuesday's decision reduces
Shore's conviction to a misdemeanor simple assault. He no longer will have to
finish serving his 120-day sentence. Shore already had spent 72
days at Honolulu's Ford Island brig when he was released May 1 pending a
clemency decision by Brig. Gen. Michael Bednarek, commander of the
Hawaii-based 25th Infantry Division, in which Shore serves. Bednarek's order also reinstated
Shore as a specialist - he had been reduced two grades to a private. Shore said he ripped off the
private patch from his uniform and threw it down on the floorboard of his car
as soon as he was informed of Bednarek's decision Tuesday. "I feel good. It's
starting to be over with," he said in a telephone interview Wednesday.
He said he has been waiting for this day since his ordeal began last June
during a nighttime raid near the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk. The Army charged Shore and
his platoon sergeant Sgt. 1st Class Trey Corrales of San Antonio with the
murder that night of an Iraqi detainee later identified as Salih Khatab
Aswad. At his court-martial, Shore
maintained his innocence and testified that Corrales ordered him to
"finish" the already wounded Iraqi man. He said he fired his M-4
rifle but deliberately missed. Corrales was tried
separately in a court-martial last month and exonerated of all charges. Shore's attorney, Michael
Waddington of Augusta, speculated that the Corrales verdict played a role in
Bednarek's decision. Waddington praised the general for making a "just
but difficult decision" in light of political pressure on the military
to convict their own in criminal cases involving Iraqis. Shore said he hopes to still
make a career in the Army. He said now he can make sergeant, a rank that he
would have gained by now if not for the charges. In Georgia, friends and
family celebrated the news. "I am wonderful
today," said Shore's father, Brian, of Lawrenceville. "But I still
have no love for the Army. They've done a lot of young men wrong." State Sen. John Douglas
(R-Social Circle) said the Army had wrongly sought to punish a low-ranking
soldier while setting his sergeant free. "I am delighted how it
all came out and that the Army corrected its injustice," said Douglas,
chairman of the Veterans and Military Affairs Committee. External link: http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/gwinnett/stories/2008/05/22/shore_gwx0522.html |