[Al Arabiya Latest] U.S. Justice Department prosecutors asked a federal judge on Friday to dismiss the charges against one of five Blackwater security guards accused of killing 14 unarmed Iraqi civilians in a 2007 shooting in Baghdad.
In a brief court notice, prosecutors said they filed a motion to dismiss the indictment against Nicholas Slatten of Sparta, Tennessee, but they also said they requested the ability to possibly refile the charges later.
Slatten was one of five men charged in December last year with 14 counts of manslaughter, 20 counts of attempt to commit manslaughter and one weapons violation count over the shooting that outraged Iraqis and strained relations between the two countries.
| Except that Blackwater was clever enough to have taped the entire encounter, which revealed their men responded to an attack, they didn't start it. One assumes that of course the other charges will be dropped in the very near future. One wonders how much business the company picked up from customers reassured that their people would not be put at risk to comply with ridiculous rules of engagement... |
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