Blackwater Security Guards Charged With Manslaughter

http://www.truthout.org/120808S

Monday 08 December 2008

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by: Del Quentin Wilber, The Washington Post

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Blackwater employees in Najaf, Iraq, in 2004. Five blackwater employees have been charged with the brutal shooting of 14 Iraqis in Nisoor Square. (Photo: Gervasio Sanchez / Associated Press)

Five Blackwater Worldwide security guards charged in the shooting deaths of 14 Iraqi civilians last year turned themselves in to federal authorities in Salt Lake City this morning, according to their attorneys, and the Justice Department unsealed a 35-count indictment against them.

The five guards were indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury in Washington in connection with the shooting, which occurred Sept. 16, 2007, in Baghdad's bustling Nisoor Square. The indictment said all five were charged with voluntary manslaughter; attempt to commit manslaughter; and using and discharging a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence.

A sixth security guard, Jeremy P. Ridgeway, pleaded guilty Friday to charges of voluntary manslaughter and attempt to commit voluntary manslaughter, according to papers filed in
court today.

The five guards indicted in the case are Evan Liberty, 26, a former Marine of Rochester, N.H.; Nick Slatten, 25, a former Army sergeant of Sparta, Tenn.; Dustin Heard, 27, a former Marine corporal of Maryville, Tenn.; Donald Ball, 26, a former Marine corporal of Salt Lake City; and Paul Slough, 29, of Sanger, Tex., who served in the Army and the Texas National Guard. All except Liberty served with the military in Iraq. After concluding their service, the men signed up with Blackwater to provide security in the country.



The papers unsealed today allege that the five security guards and Ridgeway "opened fire with automatic weapons and grenade launchers on unarmed civilians," killing 14 people and wounding at least 20, when their convoy pulled into the square that day.

"None of these victims was an insurgent, and many were shot inside of civilian vehicles that were attempting to flee," the prosecutors wrote in the papers. One Iraqi was shot in the chest while standing in the street with his hands up, according to the prosecutors.

The guards' attorneys said they will fight the government on jurisdictional and factual grounds. They also will fight the government over the potential trial's venue. By turning themselves in to authorities in Utah, the guards are hoping to bolster their argument that the trial should be heard in that conservative state, not the District.

Steven McCool, who represent Ball, said his client was turning himself in to authorities in Utah because he has "a constitutional right to venue, to be tried in his home state."

"To protect that constitutional right, we have surrendered in Utah," McCool said.

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