Ummmm, that would be US troops:
"Military Jury Acquits Army Sniper of Premeditated Murder in Killings of 3 Iraqis" by PAUL von ZIELBAUER
The leader of an Army sniper unit was acquitted yesterday of premeditated murder charges in connection with the killings of three Iraqi men in a region south of Baghdad last spring.
A military jury found the soldier, Staff Sgt. Michael A. Hensley, 27, of the First Battalion, 501st Infantry Regiment, Fourth Brigade (Airborne), 25th Infantry Division, not guilty of murder in the three killings on separate occasions in April and May near Iskandariya.
He was found guilty of wrongfully placing an AK-47 rifle with the remains of one of the three men and of showing disrespect for a superior officer.
The verdict was handed down late yesterday evening at Camp Liberty, Iraq, the sprawling American military base where the court-martial of Sergeant Hensley, of Candler, N.C., was held. Neither Sergeant Hensley nor his parents, Christian missionaries who had returned from Macedonia this year to support their son, could be immediately reached for comment.
In an e-mail interview last month, Sergeant Hensley, an Army Ranger who was brought into the sniper unit to train other soldiers to become more deadly, said he felt bitter toward First Battalion’s two senior leaders for making him “the fall guy” for tactics they had encouraged.
What he is talking about is the Asymmetrical Warfare Group
Sergeant Hensley, referring to Lt. Col. Robert Balcavage and Command Sgt. Maj. Bernie Knight, respectively:
“I felt betrayed by my battalion commander and command sergeant major. Every last man we killed was a confirmed terrorist. We were praised when bad guys died. We were upbraided when bad guys did not die.”
Colonel Balcavage and Sergeant Major Knight could not be reached for comment. The jury will begin deliberating today on a sentence.
Last month, a military jury found one of the other team members, Specialist Jorge G. Sandoval, not guilty of killing two men, on April 27 and May 11, but convicted him of planting evidence on one of the bodies. An evidentiary hearing for the third member of the team, Sgt. Evan Vela, who is accused of shooting a man in the head on May 11 after Sergeant Hensley captured him, is to begin later this month.
Sergeant Hensley is accused of killing a man on April 14 after reporting that he saw the man laying wire for a bomb, court documents said. He was also charged with murder in the April 27 and May 11 killings.
All three snipers’ legal cases have raised questions about how military commanders in Iraq have changed or expanded the rules for targeting and killing enemy forces in Iraq during a determined insurgency."
Or anyone else who comes close to the trap, for that matter!
