The War Profiteers - War Crimes, Kidnappings & Torture

 

December 1st, 2008 - Ex-Marine Acquitted of Crimes Seeks Job Back with Riverside Police

News article by the Riverside Press-Enterprise

Summary of the Falluja Killings

Ex-Marine Acquitted of Crimes Still Seeks Job Back with Riverside Police

 

By Doug Haberman

Riverside Press-Enterprise

December 1, 2008

 

A fired Riverside police officer who sought to get his job back after he was acquitted of war crimes has had no luck with the city, his attorney said.

 

"Riverside Police Department has not come through" for Jose Luis Nazario Jr., attorney Kevin McDermott said.

 

Police Chief Russ Leach said he couldn't comment on a personnel matter and department spokesman Steven Frasher would only say Nazario is not on the force.

 

Nazario Jr., 29, was a probationary officer with the department when a military investigator arrested the former Marine in August 2007.

 

The department immediately fired Nazario, who was two months short of completing his probationary period.

 

In the first-ever civilian court trial of a veteran stemming from combat actions, Nazario was charged with shooting to death two unarmed insurgents and ordering the killing of two others in 2004 in Fallujah, Iraq, while serving in the Marine Corps.

 

A federal jury in Riverside acquitted him in August.

 

After the verdict, Nazario walked to Riverside Police Department headquarters a couple of blocks from the courthouse to ask for his job back.

 

McDermott said Nazario hasn't given up on the Riverside job but has applied to the Riverside County Sheriff's Department and to police departments in other Southern California cities.

 

External link: http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_nazario02.e106cb.html

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