Clearing the Fog of War

Bergdahl read his rights at Fort Sam session

SAN ANTONIO — Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl met Wednesday with an investigator who is probing allegations of misconduct while the soldier was in Afghanistan.

Flanked by a military defense attorney, Capt. Alfredo Foster, and Yale Law School visiting lecturer Eugene Fidell, who is his civilian lawyer, Bergdahl sat in an office at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston.

Fidell said his client was read his rights as part of an interview with Maj. Gen. Kenneth Dahl. An audio recording was made during the question-and-answer session at the Army Criminal Investigation Command's office on the post.

“We've met all morning, we're on a lunch break and then we're going to resume the interview,” Fidell said, declining to say what questions Dahl asked. “But I can tell you he's been entirely cooperative with the process and has answered all questions.”

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Hasan loses another bid to dump the death penalty

FORT HOOD — An Army judge Wednesday rejected a bid by Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan to escape the death penalty in the November 2009 rampage here that killed 13 people and wounded 32.

At a hearing in a small Fort Hood courtroom, Col. Tara Osborn quickly swatted down a motion by Hasan's military defense team to throw out capital punishment.

She did it in a businesslike fashion after hearing arguments from both sides, and quickly moved onto other issues as the paralyzed Hasan sat silently in his wheelchair wearing a long, scruffy beard, which he grew in violation of Army regulations.

Hasan's beard has been a point of contention for months. The previous judge in the case, Col. Gregory Gross, had ordered Hasan to shave before standing trail. Osborn was appointed after an appeals court removed Gross, whom the court said didn't appear impartial.

Osborn said Wednesday the court didn't have the authority to stop the Fort Hood command from requiring Hasan to shave his beard before the trial, which could be delayed until this summer.

Hasan's lawyers have said previously that military law failed to provide constitutional protections that are given in civilian courts.

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Appeals court tosses Hasan's judge

A Washington, D.C. appeals court today ordered the removal of the military judge in the trial of an Army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people in a 2009 Fort Hood shooting spree.

The Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, hearing a long-disputed order requiring Maj. Nidal Hasan to shave a beard he grew in violation of Army regulations, found that the judge, Col. Gregory Gross, had displayed an “appearance of bias” in the case.

The court, in an opinion released late in the afternoon, ruled that “a reasonable person, knowing all the relevant facts, would harbor doubts about the military judge's impartiality.”

It threw out six contempt citations Gross had issued, but did not rule on whether Hasan had to shave.

“Should the next military judge find it necessary to address (Hasan's) beard, such issues should be addressed and litigated anew,” the court said in its opinion.

Hasan faces the death penalty for the Nov. 5, 2009 rampage that left 13 dead and 32 others wounded. He grew a beard last summer, prompting Gross to fine him $1,000 on six occasions.

Hasan said he grew the beard because of his Muslim faith. His lead defense attorney, Lt. Col. Kris Poppe, contended in a Sept. 6 hearing that Hasan's religious beliefs drove his decision to grow the beard.

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Fort Hood shooting suspect hospitalized

Fort Hood rampage suspect Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan was in an Army hospital Monday and was expected to remain there through midweek.

Post spokesman Chris Haug said Hasan was admitted Saturday to Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center at Fort Hood. A news release said he is in good condition and is expected to be released within 48 hours.

No information on why he was hospitalized was provided because of federal rules on patient confidentiality, but Hasan's former civilian lawyer said his health has been precarious since being badly wounded at the end of the shooting spree Nov. 5, 2009.

“His condition is serious,” retired Army Col. John Galligan said of Hasan, who was shot four times and is paralyzed from the chest down.

Hasan is charged with killing 13 people and wounding 32 others in the mass shooting at the Soldier Readiness Center at Fort Hood.

Hasan has been kept at Bell County Jail in Belton, 22 miles east of Fort Hood, since he was released from San Antonio Military Medical Center, where he was treated for his wounds in the weeks after the shooting.

Haug said Hasan's hospitalization would not affect the schedule for his upcoming capital murder trial. The trial, which was to have started Aug. 20, has been stalled as attorneys skirmish over the former psychiatrist's bid to wear a scruffy beard.

Hasan has said he grew the beard out of duty to his Muslim faith, but beards have been forbidden in the military, with rare exceptions. In a recent hearing, he told his judge that the beard was central to his faith and that he wasn't “trying to disrupt the proceedings.”

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Defendant Hasan told to shave or be shaved

FORT HOOD — A running dispute over a beard grown by Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan that has delayed his murder trial took a step toward resolution when a military judge ordered him Thursday to get rid of it or have it shaved by force.

Col. Gregory Gross previously had vowed to issue the order, but an appeals court kicked the case back to him to hear further arguments that pitted competing versions of why the one-time Army psychiatrist grew the beard — and whether the Constitution's protection of religious freedom allowed him to keep it.

Hasan, 41, who's charged with killing 13 people and wounding 32 others in a Nov. 9, 2009, shooting spree at Fort Hood, said he grew the beard because of his Muslim faith.

Defense lawyer Lt. Col. Kris Poppe contended in an hourlong hearing that Hasan's religious beliefs drove his decision to grow the beard.

A prosecutor, Maj. Larry Downend, said Hasan wore it to show allegiance to Islamic militants and make it harder for eyewitnesses to identify him.

The judge ultimately ruled the government had “a compelling interest” in shaving the beard, saying: “I am ordering the accused to be clean-shaven for all subsequent pretrial hearings and the trial.”

The ruling effectively puts the trial on hold. Two military appeals courts likely will hear arguments, and attorneys familiar with the case say a federal court could step in as well before the matter is settled.

Hasan, who first appeared in court June 8 with the beard but was clean-shaven the day of the shootings, has been fined $6,000 for violating Army regulations that strictly limit facial hair to moustaches and sideburns. The trial was to begin Aug. 20.

Attorneys for Hasan have said in a motion that he “is a practicing Muslim and has recently had a premonition that his death is imminent. He does not wish to die without a beard as he believes not having a beard is a sin.”

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Hasan's beard may delay trial past holiday season

FORT HOOD — If things had stayed on schedule, a trial would have started two weeks ago for Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, but instead a judge and his attorneys have sparred over a thick beard he has grown in violation of Army regulations.

The start date of his trial, Aug. 20, has come and gone, and on Labor Day weekend no one knows when Hasan will finally face a jury.

Observers familiar with the case say the trial could begin before the third anniversary of the Nov. 5, 2009, rampage that left 13 dead and 32 other injured — or after it.

“In a case that's going to take this long,” said Frank Spinner, one of the nation's most high-profile military defense attorneys, “the practical side of it is you're coming on Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays, and it really becomes an issue of are you going to start a trial that may take weeks to litigate that will be broken up by those holidays?”

A trial next year galls soldiers who say Hasan already ought to be on death row. But Spinner, who defended Master Sgt. Timothy Hennis, a GI sentenced to die in 2010 by a military court for killing a woman and two of her young daughters, wouldn't be surprised.

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Army says Fort Hood suspect's beard has to go

Military lawyers Wednesday argued to an appeals court that a judge can tell Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan to shave his beard before his capital murder trial begins at Fort Hood.

Hasan was only days from the start of a trial on charges of killing 13 people and wounding 32 when the appeals court intervened.

Col. Gregory Gross, who has fined Hasan $5,000 for violating an order to shave, said that he would “force (Hasan) to be shaved if he doesn't do it voluntarily” as the trial's “more critical stages” occur.

Hasan contends the beard is an expression of his religious faith. His attorneys said in a motion that Hasan, who faces the death penalty if he is found guilty, “is a practicing Muslim and has recently had a premonition that his death is imminent. He does not wish to die without a beard as he believes not having a beard is a sin.”

Gross said he didn't doubt Hasan's sincerity but has stated, “It doesn't matter. The rules are the rules. They apply to everybody.”

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Hasan attempts to plead guilty in fatal rampage at Fort Hood

Nearly three years after being called the triggerman behind the worst shooting ever on a U.S. military post, Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan filed a statement with the court Wednesday saying he was guilty.

Wearing a scruffy beard that has prompted the judge to fine him five times, Hasan entered a motion stating that he wished to plead guilty for religious reasons.

The defense submitted a written motion that the judge, Col. Gregory Gross, quickly denied. Gross, who is barred by military law from accepting a guilty plea in capital cases, said he'd enter a not-guilty plea instead.

Before arguments could be made from both sides on that, a military appeals court intervened, delaying proceedings while it resolves a dispute over Hasan's beard. The court-martial was to start Monday.

Geoffrey Corn, a former Army lawyer familiar with the case, called Hasan's plea a “bizarre tactic” designed to limit a full-throated prosecution effort. Prosecutors would not comment.

“This could be in some ways the prosecution's worst nightmare,” said Corn, a professor at South Texas College of Law in Houston. “They're ready to prove their case, the shock effect, the drama of witnesses coming in.”

Arraigned more than two years ago, Hasan, charged with killing 13 people and wounding 32 others, never has entered a plea. His military defense team was to enter one Wednesday as the court-martial neared.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/military/article/Hasan-attempts-to-plead-guilty-in-fatal-rampage-3791152.php#ixzz23lKbZmst

 

Some labeling Hasan a 'terrorist'

FORT HOOD — A string of witnesses in an evidentiary hearing identified Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan as the triggerman at a Fort Hood deployment center that left 45 dead and injured.

As his trial nears almost three years later, few here argue over his guilt. They wonder why a psychiatrist would gun down fellow soldiers.

Rep. John Carter, R-Round Rock can explain it. He calls Hasan a domestic terrorist, something prosecutors have never claimed, and says those avoiding the term are indulging in political correctness.

“Believe me, my friend, if somebody had jumped up and said, ‘Praise God and Jesus Christ!' and started shooting,” he said, “the headline would have said, ‘Christian right-wing zealot kills soldiers.'”

Prosecutors last week inched closer to branding Hasan a terrorist. They sought to put terrorism consultant Evan Kohlmann on a list of witnesses when Hasan's capital murder trial starts next Monday.

Testifying Thursday via phone, Kohlmann said Hasan is like the other home-grown terrorists he has studied. The judge in the case, Col. Gregory Gross, hasn't decided if Kohlmann will testify, but putting him on the stand raises the stakes for Hasan.

Prosecutors didn't respond when asked why they wanted to bring Kohlmann into the trial, or if he's to be used to help prove the attack was a terrorist act. However, retired Army Lt. Col. Geoffrey Corn said they could call him as a rebuttal witness during the trial's sentencing phase if Hasan testifies or gives a statement.

Corn, a professor at South Texas College of Law in Houston who closely follows the case, also said it was telling the Army didn't create a charge based on a belief that the shooting was a terrorist act — as it could have done.

“It's an interesting policy debate, public debate, maybe political debate but from a legal perspective, predominantly a distraction,” he said. “A prosecutor's job is to make things as clear and as simple as possible.”

Still, Carter and others, some of them Fort Hood troops, point to the start of the melee as proof that Hasan declared jihad when he opened fire on a crowded post deployment center on Nov. 5, 2009.

Witnesses say Hasan jumped on a desk and cried out, “Allahu Akbar!,” Arabic for God is great. They said he mowed down GIs with two handguns and extended-round clips.

Thirteen died.

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