http://news.yahoo.com/...
From AP U.S. investigators have asked Iraqi authorities to assist them in the exhumation of the Iraq girl, Abeer Qassim Hamza who was allegedly rape anf murdered by soldiers of the 502 Infantry regiment.
The main points which I gathered from the article
1. The Army says says she was 20 years old. I remember initially they claimed she was 25. The U.S. army spokesman indiacates that he has seen documents giving her age as 14. Remember her family was claiming she was 15 ?
2.Excerpted According to an
FBI affidavit, Green and at least two others targeted the teenager and her family for a week before the attack, which wasn't revealed until witnesses came forward in late June.
The soldiers drank alcohol, abandoned their checkpoint, changed clothes to avoid detection and headed to the victims' house, about 200 yards from a U.S. military checkpoint in the so-called "Triangle of Death", a Sunni Arab area south of Baghdad known for its violence, the affidavit said.
So it appears that there was a level of harrasment before the attack. Remember how neighbours claimed that the parents were asking if they should send thier daughter to live with relatives becuase she was receiving undue attention ?
3.The Army worries that the exhumation will offend Muslim sensibilites but the family is eager to give permission and the Army says they may allow family members or a religious leader to be present to ensure her body isnt desecrated.
That's progess at least.
Lastly 4. Green, who served 11 months with the 101st Airborne Division, based at Fort Campbell, Ky., received an honorable discharge and left the army in mid-May. He was discharged because of an "anti-social personality disorder," according to military officials and court documents.
But even before the rape-murder allegation surfaced, the military was investigating an incident in which three soldiers from the same battalion were killed by insurgents near Youssifiyah. Two of them apparently were abducted and slain, with their bodies mutilated.
U.S. officials insist they have no evidence that the incidents are related.
gee. .
I'm not going to comment because I'm just so maddened by all of this.