CAMP PENDLETON -- Attorneys for two of seven Marines charged with premeditated murder in the shooting of an Iraqi civilian in April accused the military Thursday of refusing to provide basic information necessary to prepare their defenses.

Ongoing Coverage: Hamdania

They also complained that the Marine Corps has denied a request that they be allowed to hire an independent investigator to travel to the scene of the incident.

"The government had no problem sending my client over there three times in defense of our country's freedoms and liberties," said attorney Joseph Low, who represents Cpl. Marshall Magincalda. "Therefore, they should have no objection to sending an investigator over there once in defense of those rights that he risked his life for."

Lt. Col. Sean Gibson at Camp Pendleton said it would be premature to send an investigator to Iraq before hearings are held later this summer to determine whether the charges against the seven Marines and one Navy corpsman stand.

The men are accused of conspiring to kidnap and kill Hashim Ibrahim Awad and then lie about what happened.

"At the appropriate time in the proceeding, and if warranted and requested, the defense attorney may be given access to the crime scene via military means," Gibson said. "It would be premature to do so prior to the Article 32 hearings."

An Article 32 hearing is the first step in the military judicial process of determining whether criminal charges against an accused will stand and they will go to trial. The hearings for the accused men are expected to begin in late August or early September.

Attorney Jane Siegel, who represents Pfc. John Jodka III of Encinitas, also said the Marine Corps has told her it does not intend to produce any Iraqi witnesses at the hearings.

"We're being deprived of the basic tools that we need for what the Marine Corps has assured us will be a fair and impartial Article 32 hearing," said Siegel, who spent more than 20 years in the Marine Corps and has been involved in dozens of military trials.

Siegel said the letter denying a visit to the Iraqi village of Hamdania was signed by Lt. Gen. John Sattler, commander of the I Marine Expeditionary Force based at Camp Pendleton, and given to the attorneys this week.

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service has interviewed two of Awad's brothers, his oldest son, and a cousin, Siegel said, but none will be present at the Article 32 hearings.

"We need to talk to all these people and to others that may have seen or heard something," Siegel said.

"Not being able to go to Iraq or interview these people just guts any possibility that we could provide the other side of the case."

The men allegedly told their Marine commanders that Awad was killed after he was spotted planting a roadside bomb. The Marine Corps has charged the men with abducting Awad from his home, binding his hands and feet and shooting him, then staging the scene with a stolen shovel and AK-47 assault rifle and expended shells to make it appear as though he was planting a bomb.

"This was a well-known individual who supposedly was taken out in the middle of the night who never screamed or struggled and allegedly walked with these Marines to a site several hundred meters away," Siegel said. "We want to know who saw what."

Gibson said there is no assurance that any of Awad's relatives or any other witnesses interviewed in Iraq would come to the U.S. for the hearings or any subsequent trials.

"There is no mechanism in place to compel them to testify," Gibson said.

Siegel said she anticipates the Marine Corps will put on a "paper case" based on reports from investigators and then say that it has presented probable cause sufficient to believe the charges against the men are true.

The other defendants are Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins III, Navy Hospitalman 3rd Class Melson Bacos, Cpl. Trent Thomas and Lance Cpls. Tyler A Jackson, Robert Pennington and Jerry Shumate Jr.

They are assigned to Camp Pendleton's 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment. Another group of Marines from Pendleton's 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment are being investigated in a separate case involving the deaths of 24 civilians in the city of Haditha in November.

The defense attorneys, hired by the men's families as additional counsel to the military attorneys appointed by the Marine Corps, also complain they still do not have complete autopsy or forensic reports. Awad's body was exhumed in June and examined at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware before being returned to Hamdania and reburied.

Gibson said that preliminary reports were given to the attorneys in late June and that final reports have not been completed.

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