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Government Trips Over Own Feet, Blackwater Skips Away Giggling

Started by Cainad (dec.), October 21, 2010, 01:12:10 PM

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Cainad (dec.)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/21/world/21contractors.html

QuoteWASHINGTON — Nearly four years after the federal government began a string of investigations and criminal prosecutions against Blackwater Worldwide personnel accused of murder and other violent crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, the cases are beginning to fall apart, burdened by a legal obstacle of the government's own making.

In the most recent and closely watched case, the Justice Department on Monday said that it would not seek murder charges against Andrew J. Moonen, a Blackwater armorer accused of killing a guard assigned to an Iraqi vice president on Dec. 24, 2006. Justice officials said that they were abandoning the case after an investigation that began in early 2007, and included trips to Baghdad by federal prosecutors and F.B.I. agents to interview Iraqi witnesses.

The government's decision to drop the Moonen case follows a series of failures by prosecutors around the country in cases aimed at former personnel of Blackwater, which is now known as Xe Services. In September, a Virginia jury was unable to reach a verdict in the murder trial of two former Blackwater guards accused of killing two Afghan civilians. Late last year, charges were dismissed against five former Blackwater guards who had been indicted on manslaughter and related weapons charges in a September 2007 shooting incident in Nisour Square in Baghdad, in which 17 Iraqi civilians were killed.

So, who else is entirely unsurprised? :kingmeh:

Disco Pickle

Quote from: Cainad on October 21, 2010, 01:12:10 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/21/world/21contractors.html

QuoteWASHINGTON — Nearly four years after the federal government began a string of investigations and criminal prosecutions against Blackwater Worldwide personnel accused of murder and other violent crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, the cases are beginning to fall apart, burdened by a legal obstacle of the government's own making.

In the most recent and closely watched case, the Justice Department on Monday said that it would not seek murder charges against Andrew J. Moonen, a Blackwater armorer accused of killing a guard assigned to an Iraqi vice president on Dec. 24, 2006. Justice officials said that they were abandoning the case after an investigation that began in early 2007, and included trips to Baghdad by federal prosecutors and F.B.I. agents to interview Iraqi witnesses.

The government's decision to drop the Moonen case follows a series of failures by prosecutors around the country in cases aimed at former personnel of Blackwater, which is now known as Xe Services. In September, a Virginia jury was unable to reach a verdict in the murder trial of two former Blackwater guards accused of killing two Afghan civilians. Late last year, charges were dismissed against five former Blackwater guards who had been indicted on manslaughter and related weapons charges in a September 2007 shooting incident in Nisour Square in Baghdad, in which 17 Iraqi civilians were killed.

So, who else is entirely unsurprised? :kingmeh:

not in the least.

"Events in the past may be roughly divided into those which probably never happened and those which do not matter." --William Ralph Inge

"sometimes someone confesses a sin in order to take credit for it." -- John Von Neumann

Jenne

Oh now THAT was a foregone conclusion.  You don't use a force like Xe/Blackwater UNLESS you can pretty much get away with it.

Richter

Rumor mill material I've heard has Blackwater taking the heat for things US soldiers have done.  Well paid scapegoat, among other things.
Quote from: Eater of Clowns on May 22, 2015, 03:00:53 AM
Anyone ever think about how Richter inhabits the same reality as you and just scream and scream and scream, but in a good way?   :lulz:

Friendly Neighborhood Mentat

Suu

QuoteI say, therefore, that the arms with which a prince defends his state are either his own, or they are mercenaries, auxiliaries, or mixed. Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous; and if one holds his state based on these arms, he will stand neither firm nor safe; for they are disunited, ambitious and without discipline, unfaithful, valiant before friends, cowardly before enemies; they have neither the fear of God nor fidelity to men, and destruction is deferred only so long as the attack is; for in peace one is robbed by them, and in war by the enemy. The fact is, they have no other attraction or reason for keeping the field than a trifle of stipend, which is not sufficient to make them willing to die for you. They are ready enough to be your soldiers whilst you do not make war, but if war comes they take themselves off or run from the foe; which I should have little trouble to prove, for the ruin of Italy has been caused by nothing else than by resting all her hopes for many years on mercenaries, and although they formerly made some display and appeared valiant amongst themselves, yet when the foreigners came they showed what they were. Thus it was that Charles, King of France, was allowed to seize Italy with chalk in hand; and he who told us that our sins were the cause of it told the truth, but they were not the sins he imagined, but those which I have related. And as they were the sins of princes, it is the princes who have also suffered the penalty.

Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, Chapter XII, How Many Kinds Of Soldiery There Are, And Concerning Mercenaries.
Sovereign Episkopos-Princess Kaousuu; Esq., Battle Nun, Bene Gesserit.
Our Lady of Perpetual Confusion; 1st Church of Discordia

"Add a dab of lavender to milk, leave town with an orange, and pretend you're laughing at it."

Bebek Sincap Ratatosk

Quote from: Doktor Princess on October 21, 2010, 03:02:28 PM
QuoteI say, therefore, that the arms with which a prince defends his state are either his own, or they are mercenaries, auxiliaries, or mixed. Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous; and if one holds his state based on these arms, he will stand neither firm nor safe; for they are disunited, ambitious and without discipline, unfaithful, valiant before friends, cowardly before enemies; they have neither the fear of God nor fidelity to men, and destruction is deferred only so long as the attack is; for in peace one is robbed by them, and in war by the enemy. The fact is, they have no other attraction or reason for keeping the field than a trifle of stipend, which is not sufficient to make them willing to die for you. They are ready enough to be your soldiers whilst you do not make war, but if war comes they take themselves off or run from the foe; which I should have little trouble to prove, for the ruin of Italy has been caused by nothing else than by resting all her hopes for many years on mercenaries, and although they formerly made some display and appeared valiant amongst themselves, yet when the foreigners came they showed what they were. Thus it was that Charles, King of France, was allowed to seize Italy with chalk in hand; and he who told us that our sins were the cause of it told the truth, but they were not the sins he imagined, but those which I have related. And as they were the sins of princes, it is the princes who have also suffered the penalty.

Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, Chapter XII, How Many Kinds Of Soldiery There Are, And Concerning Mercenaries.

THIS. Nothing new here...
- I don't see race. I just see cars going around in a circle.

"Back in my day, crazy meant something. Now everyone is crazy" - Charlie Manson

Suu

The best part about The Prince...it was written in satire. Machiavelli was a firm believer of the republic, not a monarchy.
Sovereign Episkopos-Princess Kaousuu; Esq., Battle Nun, Bene Gesserit.
Our Lady of Perpetual Confusion; 1st Church of Discordia

"Add a dab of lavender to milk, leave town with an orange, and pretend you're laughing at it."

Cuddlefish

A fisher of men, or a manner of fish?

Suu

Sovereign Episkopos-Princess Kaousuu; Esq., Battle Nun, Bene Gesserit.
Our Lady of Perpetual Confusion; 1st Church of Discordia

"Add a dab of lavender to milk, leave town with an orange, and pretend you're laughing at it."