Court Martial

Asked to describe his four years behind bars for killing an unarmed Iraqi, Marine Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins III recites the opening stanza of the poem "Invictus": "Out of the night that covers me Black as the Pit from pole to pole I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul." If Hutchins, 26, is ultimately freed to return to his native Massachusetts and his 6-year-old daughter, he should also thank his lawyers and the military appeals court system.

Military prosecutors have decided to appeal a court decision that overturned the conviction of Lawrence Hutchins, a former Marine sergeant and squad leader still behind bars in the 2006 execution-style killing of an Iraqi man. Hutchins, 26, now in the brig at Camp Pendleton, was among seven Marines and a Navy corpsman sentenced in the killing. He was convicted in 2007 of unpremeditated murder and sentenced to a dishonorable discharge and 15 years in prison. The prison sentence was reduced to 11 years by the commanding general.

A military appeals court Thursday overturned the conviction of a Camp Pendleton Marine in the execution-style killing of an Iraqi man in 2006 in Hamandiya, west of Baghdad. The Washington, D.C., court found that then-Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins was denied a fair trial because one of his lead attorneys was allowed to leave the case just before his court-martial. The attorney left active duty. Hutchins, 26, is serving an 11-year sentence at Ft. Leavenworth, Kan. The Marine Corps has 30 days to decide whether to appeal the 8-1 decision of the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals.

A military judge Friday rejected a defense request to throw out charges against the last Marine accused in the killing of 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha in 2005. The judge, Lt. Col. David Jones, had ruled Tuesday it was possible that two generals who brought charges against Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich had been subject to what the military calls undue command influence. But Friday, Jones ruled that he saw no indication of actual influence on Gen. James Mattis or retired Lt. Gen. Samuel Helland.

Army 1st Lt. Ehren Watada will be discharged by the end of the week, concluding the fight over his refusal to deploy to Iraq, an Army spokesman said Monday. After a court-martial proceeding that ended in a mistrial, the Army has elected not to attempt further prosecution and instead will discharge the first lieutenant, who argued he would be participating in war crimes if he fought in Iraq. "What was approved was basically his request to resign in lieu of a general court-martial for the good of the service," said spokesman Joseph Piek at Ft. Lewis, Wash.

Murder charges against a Marine sergeant in the death of a prisoner in Fallouja, Iraq, will not be dropped despite the acquittal of two Marines in the same case. Lt. Gen. Samuel Helland, commander of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, has decided that the case against Sgt. Jermaine Nelson should proceed to a court-martial. Nelson's supporters hoped the case would be dropped after the acquittals of Sgt. Ryan Weemer and former Sgt. Jose Nazario. Nelson is charged with unpremeditated murder and dereliction of duty in the alleged killing of a prisoner during the assault on insurgents in November 2005.

A Marine Corps sergeant charged with murdering an Iraqi prisoner told an investigator that he is tormented by the shooting and has tried to forget what happened that day in Fallouja in 2004, according to a tape-recording played Wednesday at his court-martial. In the recording, Sgt. Ryan Weemer talked of being covered with the blood of his best friend, who was killed by a sniper, and then minutes later being ordered by his squad leader to kill an Iraqi taken prisoner when Marines stormed a house.

Seven Polish troops had no reason to launch a 2007 mortar and machine-gun attack that killed six civilians in an Afghan village, a prosecutor argued at the start of their court-martial. Prosecutor Jakub Mytych read out an indictment that accused the two officers, three enlisted men and two warrant officers serving with NATO forces of violating laws that protect civilians in time of war. Six of the soldiers could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted, and the seventh could get 25 years.