Soldiers Charged in Iraqi Deaths

Two Americans Accused of Premeditated Murder in Separate Cases

By Joshua Partlow
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, July 1, 2007; A16

BAGHDAD, June 30 -- Two American soldiers were charged with the premeditated murders of three Iraqis in separate incidents south of Baghdad over the past three months, the U.S. military said Saturday.

Army Staff Sgt. Michael A. Hensley of Candler, N.C., was charged with three counts of premeditated murder, obstruction of justice and wrongfully placing weapons next to the victims' bodies.

Spec. Jorge G. Sandoval Jr. of Laredo, Tex., was charged with premeditated murder and planting a weapon.

Both soldiers, assigned to the headquarters of the 1st Battalion, 501st Infantry Regiment of the 25th Infantry Division, based at Fort Richardson, Alaska, are being held in Kuwait until trial.

The killings took place near Iskandariyah, which is in the Sunni insurgent territory south of Baghdad where U.S. soldiers committed one of the most notorious atrocities of the war. In March 2006, soldiers raped and killed a 14-year-old girl and killed her family in the town of Mahmudiyah. Two soldiers have been convicted in the case, and three are awaiting trial.

Soldiers have been charged in previous incidents for attempting to cover up killings by planting weapons next to slain Iraqis to portray them as insurgents. In April 2006, seven U.S. Marines and a Navy medic were accused of taking part in the killing of a 52-year-old Iraqi man in Anbar province that involved putting him in a bomb crater along with a rifle and a shovel. Several servicemen have pleaded guilty in the case.

U.S. military officials said in a statement that the charges against Hensley and Sandoval were "merely an accusation of wrongdoing" and that they are "presumed innocent unless and until they are proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of any alleged offense."

In a separate case, Command Sgt. Maj. Edward Ramsdell of the 411th Engineer Brigade was convicted of violating military rules by possessing alcohol and pornography, having an "inappropriate relationship" with a female soldier in his unit and maltreating a soldier, the U.S. military said. He was sentenced to four months in prison and demoted.

The charges were announced on a day when U.S. soldiers clashed with residents of Sadr City, the densely populated Shiite district of eastern Baghdad. The U.S. military said in a statement that shooting started before dawn after troops raided a house believed to be used by a militant network that has ties to Iran and is involved in terrorist activities. The soldiers encountered roadside bombs, fierce gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades, and killed about 26 suspected militants and detained 17, the military said.

Residents in the area and officials linked to Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi Army militia is prevalent in the district, disputed the U.S. account and said the American soldiers killed innocent civilians.

Salah al-Ubaidi, a Sadr spokesman in the southern city of Najaf, said that U.S. bombings killed four members of a family, including women, and that 16 young men were killed in Sadr City.

"There were no clashes between the Mahdi army and occupation forces," he said. "We are condemning this attack, which targeted the innocent people in their homes, and we are calling on the government to open an investigation with the occupation forces to find out what happened."

A 29-year-old member of the Mahdi Army in the neighborhood, who gave only his nickname, Abu Bakr, said the fighting took place between 3 and 5 a.m. He said U.S. soldiers killed the four family members in their house, shot up cars and left. He acknowledged that there was "random shooting" in the neighborhood but said he saw no direct attacks on U.S. troops.

"What's the goal of this savage act?" he asked. "What are they trying to do -- make the people hate Americans more or simply kill the Iraqis?"

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki issued a statement calling on U.S.-led forces to explain what happened in Sadr City and demanding that the U.S. military notify Iraqi security forces in advance of operations.

Meanwhile, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, visited the southern Baghdad neighborhood of West Rashid, a day after an armor-piercing roadside bomb killed one U.S. soldier and wounded three who were traveling in a convoy of Humvees in the area. The U.S. military believes that the type of bomb, known as an explosively formed projectile, is manufactured in Iran and used by Shiite militias.

Petraeus said U.S. military officials in coming days will "lay out for the press" the extent of Iranian support, funding and training of "secret cells" of Mahdi Army militiamen.

"There's actually been operational . . . direction provided to these militia organizations by the Iranian Quds Force," he said, referring to a militant wing of Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

"To be truthful, I don't think that any of us understood the extent of this involvement until we started really getting into the networks," he said.

Special correspondents Naseer Nouri in Baghdad and Saad Sarhan in Najaf and staff researcher Magda Jean-Louis in Washington contributed to this report.