Citing confidentiality requirements, U.S. officials declined to speak publicly about the Blackwater investigations. Iraqi victims are the only witnesses to the behind-the-scenes legal process who are willing to talk. Their accounts of the investigation jibed individually as well as with the typical narrative of U.S. criminal investigation.
Under U.S. military doctrine, rules of engagement allow U.S. soldiers and contractors in a combat zone to defend themselves if they fear they are under attack. The rules tighten and loosen as conditions on the ground shift. The Nisoor Square incident took place at the end of what had been one of the worst periods of violence in Iraq.
The Blackwater team says it was justified in firing to protect itself and the State Department officials it was guarding. Speaking before Congress, Blackwater owner Erik Prince said the team was doing its duty in the face of an onslaught, and he described the square as "a terrorist crime scene."
Prince offended those who say they were simply going about their day's chores.
Baraa Sadoon Ismail, 29, a father of two, was severely injured in the gunfire while driving to a relative's house. Doctors told him he had 60 fragments of bullet lodged in his abdomen. He said he had undergone surgery to remove three pieces that threatened major organs.
He has met with eight committees of investigators so far, including twice with the FBI. Teams of three or four people would sit in a room with him. They would show him an aerial map on a table. They asked how and when and where the shooting started. Where was this victim? Where were you?
Several times he asked about his car, which was shot up in the incident. Investigators told him it was still needed for the investigation. They wanted to know whether he planned to ask for compensation. He was miffed.
"I want you to feel that Iraqi life is precious," he said he told them.
Physician Haitham Rubaie doesn't want money either. What he wants above all is justice for his wife, a doctor, and his son, a medical student, who died.
He rebuffed attempts to have a donation to an orphanage made in his family's name. No amount of cash, no matter how well-intentioned, would sweep this under the rug.
"I don't want any help from you," he said he told them. "If you want to help the orphans, you give them money yourselves."
If North Carolina-based Blackwater wanted to negotiate, it would have to apologize, publicly and loudly, he said.
