Despicable Court-Martial Case of First of Three Navy SEALs Begins In Iraq

I've spent some time in the past getting somewhat involved in the hearings and appeals in the 1st Lt. Michael Behenna case so it absolutely turns my stomach to see today arrive. Because today marked the first day of the court-martial trial of Petty Officer 1st Class Julio Huertas, the first of three Navy SEALs accused in the case of the arrest of al Qaeda terrorist, Ahmed Hashim Abed.

A little background on the charges against Huertas and the others from the article at Breitbart:

Abed was arrested last September on charges of masterminding the grisly killings of four Blackwater security guards whose burned corpses were dragged through the Iraqi city of Fallujah west of Baghdad. Two of the guards' bodies were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River in the insurgent attack.

Huertas and Keefe are both accused of failing to safeguard the prisoner. Huertas is also accused of attempting to influence the testimony of another SEAL.
The third SEAL in the case, Petty Officer 2nd Class Matthew McCabe of Perrysburg, Ohio, is charged with punching Abed in the face at Camp Schwedler, a U.S. base near Fallujah. McCabe is scheduled to be court-martialed May 3 in Norfolk, Virginia, where the three sailors are based.

You see where the third SEAL is being tried in Virginia but the disconcerting aspect of Huertas' trial is that it is going on IN IRAQ.

Okay, I really can't express to you all how this enrages me. And I think the fact that these Navy SEALs have waived a chance at a reprimand to take their chances with court martials shows not only the integrity of these American heroes but the fact that a man will put his life on the line for honor.

And just in case you have never heard or seen just what happened in Fallujah in 2004 to the four Blackwater personnel at the hands of the terrorist who will face Petty Officer Huertas this week, watch this brief video:






It is not too late to contact your Congressman and express your outrage of these trials. At last count, 20 Congressmen have written to Defense Secretary Gates to stop this insanity. There is NO evidence of this al Qaeda's claims and at the same time, we have four of our men on trial for a fat lip versus what you just saw was done to four Americans.

All three of these Navy SEALs better be totally exonerated or I am going to lose it. Completely.

Court-martial of Navy SEAL opens in Iraq



BAGHDAD (AP) - Opening arguments began Wednesday in the court-martial of a Navy SEAL accused in the abuse of an Iraqi prisoner suspected of masterminding the killings in 2004 of four U.S. private security contractors.
Petty Officer 1st Class Julio Huertas, wearing his blue Navy uniform, appeared in a military courtroom at the Victory Base Camp outside Baghdad to answer charges of dereliction of duty and impeding an official investigation. He has pleaded not guilty.

Huertas, 28, of Blue Island, Illinois, is the first of three Navy SEALs to go on trial in connection with the alleged assault of the Iraqi prisoner, Ahmed Hashim Abed.

Abed was arrested last September on charges of masterminding the grisly killings of four Blackwater security guards whose burned corpses were dragged through the Iraqi city of Fallujah west of Baghdad. Two of the guards' bodies were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River in the insurgent attack.

The SEALs' case has gained widespread sympathy in the United States as well as support from at least 20 lawmakers in Congress who have urged U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates to drop the charges.

The sailors could have received a disciplinary reprimand, but insisted on a military trial to clear their names and save their careers.

If convicted by the six-person military jury, their punishment could include jail time.

In a rare ruling in January, a military judge ordered that trials for Huertas and Petty Officer 2nd Class Jonathan Keefe of Yorktown, Virginia, to be held in Iraq so that they could face Abed in court. Abed is still being held in Iraq, and the U.S. government refused to bring him to the United States to testify.

Huertas and Keefe are both accused of failing to safeguard the prisoner. Huertas is also accused of attempting to influence the testimony of another SEAL.

The third SEAL in the case, Petty Officer 2nd Class Matthew McCabe of Perrysburg, Ohio, is charged with punching Abed in the face at Camp Schwedler, a U.S. base near Fallujah. McCabe is scheduled to be court-martialed May 3 in Norfolk, Virginia, where the three sailors are based.

Huertas has served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Neither he nor the other two SEALS have been held in custody.

Keefe's trial also was to begin last week at the court-martial room at the Victory Base Camp, but his legal team was delayed by the volcano eruption in Iceland that grounded tens of thousands of flights across the world.

Obama Administration Won't Touch Iran's Nukes But Goes After Blackwater Officials, 5 Indicted

Okay, the Justice Department of the Federal Government played its cards today indicting the former President of Blackwater and four current officials of the security company. I guess the poker game begins, huh Attorney General Holder?

Remember everyone, this is the same Attorney General Eric Holder that worked to release convicted terrorists and personally put the kibash on prosecuting Black Panthers for their voter poll intimidation in 2008 - THE SAME ERIC HOLDER that wants to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in NYC civilian courts, THE SAME ERIC HOLDER that wants to put convicted jihadis in prison in our neighborhoods in the heartland of America and THE SAME ERIC HOLDER that said you and me, all of us, ought to be ashamed of our racism here in America.

I've had enough of this clown. The Democrats a few years ago went on a witch hunt to get then Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on some mamby pamby administrative bullshit within the AG office. So, it's time for payback. It's high time that every Republican (and Democrat with a soul) in the House and the Senate gets on the warpath and asks for the firing of Attorney General Eric Holder.

This man, Holder, is dirtier than a sow pig after a June rain in Arkansas and he literally holds the top law enforcement job in the Land. Although I think we could find charges to put Holder away, I'll be satisfied to see him thrown out of office and see his sorry ass bouncing down the steps of the Capitol.

Story from Breitbart:

APNewsBreak: Feds indict ex-Blackwater president


RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - The former president of Blackwater Worldwide was charged Friday with using straw purchases to stockpile automatic weapons at the security firm and filing false documents to cover up gifts given to the King of Jordan.
The federal indictment charges Gary Jackson, 52, who left the company last year in a management shakeup, along with four other former workers. The charges against Jackson include a conspiracy to violate firearms laws, false statements and possession of an unregistered firearm.

Also indicted were former general counsel Andrew Howell, 44; former executive vice president Bill Mathews, 44; former procurement vice president Ana Bundy, 45; and, 65-year-old Ronald Slezak, a former weapons manager.

The charges open a new front of the government's oversight of the sullied security company. Several of the company's contractors have previously been charged with federal crimes for their actions in war zones, but the company's executives have so far weathered a range of investigations.

The company has been trying to rehabilitate its image since a 2007 shooting in Baghdad left 17 people dead, outraged the Iraqi government and led to a federal charges against several Blackwater guards—accusations later thrown out of court after a judge found prosecutors mishandled evidence. Around the time that Jackson left the company, Blackwater changed its name to Xe Services.

The latest case stems from a raid conducted by federal agents at the company's headquarters in Moyock in 2008 that seized 22 weapons, including 17 AK-47s.

Blackwater signed agreements in 2005 in which the company financed the purchase of 34 automatic weapons for the Camden County sheriff's office. Sheriff Tony Perry became the official owner of the weapons, but Blackwater was allowed to keep most of the guns at its armory.

The indictment accuses Blackwater officials of enticing the local sheriff's office to pose as the purchaser of the weapons, something prosecutors called essentially a straw purchase. The office provided blank letterhead to the company, which then used the stationery to prepare letters ordering weapons.

Prosecutors said company officials, hoping to land a lucrative overseas contract, presented the king of Jordan with several firearms as gifts then realized that they were unable to account for where the weapons went. To cover it up, they falsified four federal documents "to give the appearance that the weapons had been purchased by them as individuals," according to the indictment.

Federal law prohibits licensed firearms dealers such as Blackwater to have more than two of the same style of weapon. Law enforcement agencies can have fully automatic weapons.

Kenneth Bell, an attorney for Jackson, said the former executive was a true American hero. Jackson spent two decades in the military as a Navy Seal.

"These charges are false," Bell said. "He will defend himself, as he defended this country, in what he calls the greatest justice system in the world."

Xe spokesman Mark Corallo said the company has fully cooperated with the federal investigation. He declined further comment. Jordanian officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

One of the 2005 agreements viewed later by the AP says the weapons will be kept under "lock and key" and doesn't describe whether Blackwater would use the guns. Perry said at the time that his department only used the AK-47s in shooting practice at Blackwater and that none of his 19 deputies were qualified to use them.

Blackwater has said federal authorities knew about the weapons for years and that investigators got a complete look at the company's cache in 2005 after two employees were fired.

In a 2008 interview with the AP, Jackson and other Blackwater executives said the company provided the local Camden County sheriff's office a place to store weapons, calling the gesture a "professional courtesy."

"We gave them a big safe so that they can store their own guns," Jackson said at the time. Added then-executive vice president Bill Mathews: "We give stuff to police departments all over the country, and we take particularly good care of our home police departments."

Company officials, including both Jackson and Howell, downplayed the raid during the interview. Jackson said some of the 16 uniformed officers who came to serve the warrant were embarrassed by the event and said agents had to stop at Blackwater's front gate to get passes to come onto the company's sprawling campus in northeastern North Carolina.

"As a hypothetical, one would think that, if you were going on a raid, you'd take your Kevlar and your weapon," Howell said to laughter from other executives.

Joe Biden Insists That The Obama Administration Will See That Blackwater Dismissal Is Overturned, It's Important That Americans Are Convicted

The Obama administration's year long vendetta against America continues as Vice President Joe Biden announced that the Obama administration will see to it that a court's dismissal of manslaughter charges against Blackwater agents in Iraq will be overturned - Biden has told the Iraqi government that he will bow to them and make sure that once again, Americans will be villified on the world stage.

From the report at Breitbart:

The U.S. will appeal a court decision dismissing manslaughter charges against five Blackwater Worldwide security contractors involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said Saturday.
Biden's announcement after a meeting with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani shows just how diplomatically sensitive the incident remains nearly three years later.
Blackwater security contractors were guarding U.S. diplomats when the guards opened fire in a crowded Baghdad intersection. Seventeen people were killed, including women and children, in a shooting that inflamed anti-American sentiment in Iraqi.

So, as America braces for the Obama administration's decision to try al Qaeda 9/11 plotters in a public civil trial so "they can get a fair trial", Joe Biden has decided that Americans that have already had their case dismissed, must be retried until they ARE found guilty and punished so all of the muslims of this world can rejoice.

I find it interesting that the American people don't see Joe Biden for months...we don't hear a peep from the clown and then all of a sudden he emerges and that is just in time for him to open his mouth and confirm that his role is to see that America is villified in front of the whole world.

Good work, Sheriff Joe (spit)....perhaps you can go back into hiding for three months again and reemerge in time to testify at the KSM trials about how America tortured KSM in Gitmo.

Biden: US to appeal dismissal of Blackwater case


BAGHDAD (AP) - The U.S. will appeal a court decision dismissing manslaughter charges against five Blackwater Worldwide security contractors involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said Saturday.
Biden's announcement after a meeting with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani shows just how diplomatically sensitive the incident remains nearly three years later.

Blackwater security contractors were guarding U.S. diplomats when the guards opened fire in a crowded Baghdad intersection. Seventeen people were killed, including women and children, in a shooting that inflamed anti-American sentiment in Iraqi.

Biden expressed his "personal regret" for the shooting and said the Obama administration was disappointed by the dismissal. "A dismissal is not an acquittal," he said.

The U.S. rebuffed Iraqi demands that the U.S. contractors face trial in Iraqi courts. After a lengthy investigation, U.S. prosecutors charged five of the contractors with manslaughter and took a guilty plea from a sixth.

But the case fell apart in December after a judge found that the Justice Department mishandled evidence and violated the guards' constitutional rights. Prosecutors now face difficult odds getting an appeals court to reinstate the case.

The dismissal outraged many Iraqis, who said it showed the Americans considered themselves above the law. The Iraqi government began collecting signatures for a class-action lawsuit from victims who were wounded or lost relatives.

Messages seeking comment from lawyers for the guards were not immediately returned Saturday.

Blackwater has said the guards were innocent, contending there were ambushed by insurgents. Prosecutors said the shooting was unprovoked.

Court documents paint a murky picture of a case rife with conflicting evidence. Some witnesses say the Blackwater convoy was under fire; others say it wasn't. Some said the entire convoy fired into the intersection; others said only a few men opened fire.

Even the government's key witnesses, three members of the Blackwater convoy, at times seemed to undercut the government's case.

Since the shooting, Blackwater has renamed itself Xe Services and overhauled its management. Iraq has pulled the company's license to operate in the country.