Legal officer says no one questioned Haditha deaths

By: MARK WALKER - Staff Writer | Tuesday, June 5, 2007 10:12 PM PDT ∞

CAMP PENDLETON -- No commanders sought a probe into the deaths of two dozen Iraqi civilians in Haditha in the days and weeks after the incident, a Marine Corps legal affairs officer testified Tuesday.

The testimony from the officer, Maj. Carroll Connelly, came on the sixth day of a hearing for Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani, one of four officers from Camp Pendleton's 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment charged with dereliction of duty for failing to order an investigation into the killings that would draw worldwide condemnation when brought to light several months later.

The hearing will determine whether Chessani, the highest-ranking officer charged with wrongdoing arising from the Haditha incident, will be ordered to court-martial.

Connelly said his bosses would routinely direct him to make inquiries into Iraqi civilian injuries or deaths resulting from contact with U.S. troops.

But that didn't happen in the Haditha killings, he said, because an initial, inaccurate report said the deaths stemmed from a roadside bombing followed by a gunbattle with insurgents. Civilian deaths in combat situations generally did not warrant investigation, Connelly said.

It would later be shown that 19 of the 24 Iraqis were killed inside homes where no insurgents and no weapons were found.

"My understanding, at least at the time, was that they were out in the open," Connelly said of the first report, which said 15 civilians had been killed as a result of the bombing and small-arms fire. "(The report) says they were out moving past the vehicles."

Connelly was serving as one of the 1st Marine Regiment's command staff attorneys when the slayings took place on Nov. 19, 2005.

Chessani was the battalion commander until he was removed from that post in the fallout from the incident when the unit returned in April 2006.

The civilians died after Marines from the battalion's Kilo Company reported they were under small-arms attack following the bombing and were engaged in a fight with their attackers. The slayings occurred over a roughly four-hour period after the bomb killed a lance corporal and injured two other Marines.

The first five Iraqis to die were all young men, none of whom were killed by the bomb or in any crossfire. They died after being ordered from a car that drove up after the bombing and were shot at close range, according to testimony from one of the Marines who took part in that shooting. The victims were later determined to be students on their way to a college in Ramadi.

If the initial report had in any way indicated that the civilians were killed inside their homes where no insurgents nor weapons were found, Connelly said he would have raised questions.

He also testified that a formal demand for an investigation from the Haditha town council eight days after the killings was never brought to his attention. He said he also did not know until much later that the dead included several women and children found lying in supplicant positions inside a bedroom.

"It was something different than what I had always pictured," Connelly said.

Chessani's attorneys maintain that he fully reported everything he knew about the incident, relying on that first report. It was up to commanders above him to order an investigation if they thought one was warranted, the attorneys contend.

Over the course of the hearing, prosecutors have repeatedly tried to show that Chessani learned a lot more about the killings in the days immediately after the first report. Prosecutors have focused many of their questions around the town council complaint that was presented to Chessani, suggesting that he failed to fully report that development to his superiors.

The killings did not get formally investigated until last spring and only after questions were raised by a Time magazine reporter who had heard of complaints from survivors of the dead.

Also testifying Tuesday in a base courtroom, where the Chessani hearing is playing out as his family members watch from seats directly behind him, was 1st Lt. Mark Towers, who previously served under Chessani.

"He's a godly man," Towers said of the lieutenant colonel, whose defense team includes two attorneys from the Christian-based Thomas More Law Center of Ann Arbor, Mich. "I know he has a lot of integrity ... and I know he took care of his Marines."

The hearing will conclude this week when Chessani is expected to make an unsworn statement that will not be subject to cross-examination. Attorneys will then present final arguments.

From there, the hearing officer, Col. Christopher Conlin, will write a report to Lt. Gen. James Mattis stating whether he believes the case should move forward to court-martial or that some other action should be taken. Mattis is commander of Marine Corps forces in the Middle East and as such is the "convening authority" over the Haditha prosecutions under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

The other officers accused of dereliction of duty are Capts. Randy Stone and Lucas McConnell and 1st Lt. Andrew Grayson. A pretrial hearing for Stone took place last month. The hearing officer who presided over Stone's case has yet to announce whether he believes Stone should face court-martial.

The first pretrial hearing for one of three enlisted men charged with murder in the Haditha deaths is scheduled to start Monday when Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt is due in court. Sharratt is accused of three counts of unpremeditated murder and could be sentenced to life in prison if ordered to trial and convicted.

The two other enlisted defendants charged with murder are Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich, who led the platoon, and Lance Cpl. Stephen Tatum. Their hearings are scheduled to take place later this summer.

-- Contact staff writer Mark Walker at (760) 740-3529 or mlwalker@nctimes.com.

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