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October 2nd,
2008 - US Soldier Pleads Guilty in Iraq Killings News article by the Associated
Press |
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US Soldier Pleads Guilty in
Iraq Killings By George Frey Associated Press October 2, 2008 Vilseck, Germany (AP) - A
U.S. soldier pleaded guilty Thursday to charges of accessory to murder and
was sentenced to eight months in prison for his role in the killing of four
Iraqi prisoners who were bound, blindfolded, shot and dumped in a canal. Spc. Steven Ribordy, 25, of
Salina, Kansas, also will receive a bad conduct discharge from the Army as
part of a plea deal. He also agreed to testify against other members of his
unit. The prosecutor, Capt. John
Merriam, had pressed for the maximum five years in prison. "The execution of
prisoners is arguably the greatest crime," Merriam said at Ribordy's
court martial. "It betrays everything soldiers stand for." Ribordy testified that he
had helped stand guard as the prisoners were killed by other members of his
patrol in early 2007. He said he approached the scene after the shots were
fired and saw three bodies lying in a pool of blood, and then the fourth
nearer to the canal. Ribordy told the court he
saw three other members of the patrol - Sgt. John E. Hatley, Sgt. 1st Class
Joseph P. Mayo, and Sgt. Michael P. Leahy Jr. - at the scene and smelled
gunpowder in the air. "They all seemed
calm," he said. Ribordy testified that he
helped move one of the bodies to the edge of the canal, then push it in. "I wasn't ordered or
asked in any way, shape or form to move the body," he told the court.
"I wanted to get it done and get out of there - I didn't want anybody
getting in trouble." He told judge Col. Timothy
Grammel that he was now sorry for his actions. "At the time I believed
I did the right thing," he said. "The reason I didn't say anything
was because of loyalty to my comrades." Initially charged with
conspiracy to commit murder, which carries a possible life sentence, the
charges were reduced Thursday to the lesser accessory to murder as part of
Ribordy's plea agreement. All seven soldiers allegedly
involved were assigned to the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment, 2nd
Brigade of the 1st Infantry Division in Iraq. They are now part of the
Germany-based 172nd Infantry Brigade. Last month, another soldier
charged with conspiracy to commit murder, Spc. Belmor Ramos, pleaded guilty
and was sentenced to seven months in prison and given a dishonorable
discharge. Ramos, 23, testified he had stood guard as the killings were
carried out. Ramos, of Clearfield, Utah,
was given the relatively lenient sentence as part of a deal under which he
will also testify against others alleged to have been involved in the
killings. Ramos and Ribordy were in
the same Humvee during the killings - Ramos manning the machine-gun turret
and Ribordy at the wheel, Ribordy testified. At Ramos' trial and August
hearings for Staff Sgt. Jess Cunningham and Sgt. Charles Quigley, witnesses
said four Iraqi men were bound, blindfolded, shot in the head and dumped in a
Baghdad canal - killings prosecutors said were in retribution for casualties
in the unit. Cunningham and Quigley are
awaiting decisions from their Article 32 hearings, the equivalent of a
civilian preliminary hearing, to determine whether their cases will go to
trial. In those hearings this year,
soldiers who were on the patrol said that the four unidentified Iraqis -
likely Sunnis - were taken into custody after a shootout with insurgents and
taken to the unit's operating base near Baghdad. Later that night, members of
the patrol took the four men out to a remote location and killed them, witnesses
said. Hatley, Mayo, and Leahy have
all been charged with premeditated murder, conspiracy to commit premeditated
murder and obstruction of justice. They face a hearing to
determine if there is enough evidence for them to be sent before a
court-martial, but no dates for the hearing have been set. Hatley and Leahy were also
charged with one count each of premeditated murder and conspiracy to commit
premeditated murder in a separate killing near Baghdad in January 2007. Leahy was also charged with
being an accessory after the fact in that incident, a September statement
from the Army said, without providing more details. Copyright © 2008 The
Associated Press. External link: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hYtcV7GUHRC88uGXnQ8Hl6I5lvbAD93ID6500 US Soldier Guilty
in Connection to Iraqi ‘Blindfold Killings’ By Agence France Presse October 2, 2008 Berlin - A US soldier was
sentenced to eight months in prison Thursday for his role in the killings of
four blindfolded Iraqi detainees last year, an army spokeswoman said. The defendant, Specialist
Steven Ribordy, denied a direct role in the shooting deaths in March/April
2007 at the start of his court martial but pleaded guilty to accessory after
the fact. His sentence also included a
reduction to the rank of private, forfeiture of all pay and allowances and a
dishonorable discharge from the US army. The US military court judge
had recommended the soldier be jailed for four years but a plea agreement led
to his term being reduced, a spokeswoman for the US 7th Army Joint Multinational
Training Command, Denver Makle, told AFP. "Because of the plea
bargain he will serve no more than eight months," she said, adding that
he would serve his sentence in Germany. The defendant, assigned to
the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment, was tried with three other US
soldiers in Vilseck, southern Germany. Another three may still face a court
martial. Ribordy said as part of the
plea agreement that he would testify in the remaining trials. No further details on the
case were immediately available from the court. But US media have reported
that the group killed four handcuffed and blindfolded Iraqi prisoners with
pistol shots to the head beside a Baghdad canal. The men were apparently
Shiite fighters linked to the Mahdi Army militia, which controlled the West
Rashid area of southwest Baghdad, the New York Times reported last month. The killings were allegedly
in retribution for an attack against the men's unit. The verdict came two weeks
after another defendant in the case, Specialist Belmor Ramos, was sentenced
to seven months' prison for conspiracy to commit murder. He told the court he
had stood watch while the men were shot. Copyright © 2008 AFP. External link: http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5ioXyCMcIPWNTE2p1XQY6Yh8knYSw |