Soldiers and preparing for trial
Quote:
Originally Posted by
LawVol
(taken from) The job of our combat troops is to reduce the threat not prepare for a trial.
Sometimes combat troops do have to prepare for a trial, from a UK perspective in Northern Ireland the Army did adjust to preparing for a trial, perhaps not in the early days. Towards the end the Army down to soldier level were very forensically aware and that information gathering through intelligence could become evidence. Others can comment on Malaya and other insurgencies which predate my horizon.
Now a long time ago, how about the deployment of US troops in the USA, during the rioting in Detroit and elsewhere? Was preparation for criminal trials excluded?
davidbfpo
Detroit, a lesson learned in how not to do it ...
Quote:
from David
Now a long time ago, how about the deployment of US troops in the USA, during the rioting in Detroit and elsewhere? Was preparation for criminal trials excluded?
Ken White can tell you the story from a military and police standpoint, since he was on the professional team that went in and managed to bring some order to chaos.
My experience was post-Ken's (by a couple of weeks), as part of the editorial team from Michigan Law Review that investigated and wrote up a report on the legal aspects - which I don't think is online.
Very simply, Detroit in its legal aspects (particularly, perservation of evidence) was well beyond "Fugged up".
JMM's overall assessment is I susepct quite accurate.
But the actual operation was straightforward and non problematical for us (if not for the Detroit P.D. or the poor Michigan National Guard). The only round fired in my Brigade was a harmless accidental discharge. We did throw some CS Grenades which dispersed the crowd of protesters intended but which also wafted into the City Jail. The prisoners, of course, not having masks...
Both at Little Rock, putting kids in school in 1957 and Detroit keeping kids out of jail in 1967 there were minor incidents that resulted in criminal charges before Federal Magistrates or Courts and in both State Courts. There were remarkably few detentions and most were simple and clearcut. In both cases, dues to the extremely short notice deployment, there was no preparation of the troops and no added training; everyone just acted with decency and common sense and there were no difficulties. People did have to testify in court. In Little Rock we stayed and to my knowledge all trials completed before we left. Detroit we left almost as abruptly as we arrived and witnesses were going back and forth for months afterward.
Later, in preparation for deployment to Washington DC for some anticipated riots, classes were given to the entire Division, all three Brigades -- most by civilian police officers, local North Carolina and from DC, some by JA Officers -- on arrest (of civilians not done by the US Army), detention (we do that, turn 'em over to civil authorities), evidence collection, witness statements, the whole forensic bit -- mile wide and an inch deep due to time constraints. In the event, a couple of other Brigades went but we didn't get to use the training. Fortunately, we went to Viet Nam instead. :D
I've been busy and off of here for awhile....
Just catching up.
But saw this while taking a lunch break and thought to post it here:
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/article...icence_to_kill
License to Kill
When I advised the Israel Defense Forces, here's how we decided if targeted kills were legal -- or not.
BY AMOS N. GUIORA | JULY 13, 2009
Short but very intersting read. He is a graduate of the law school at Case Western Reserve interestingly enough. Great perspective on these issues he brings to the table.
http://www.law.utah.edu/profiles/?PersonID=6581
Very limited. As the Police and Jails were overloaded
Quote:
Originally Posted by
jmm99
From what Ken writes, his unit followed a limited detention policy.
we turned them over the Cops or the MiArNG and our Engineer Company helped them build detention and processing pens in a location under the stands in one of the sports Stadiums IIRC. Best I can recall we only picked 20-some odd. Think the Bde from the 101st might have picked up some but doubt they detained many, they arrived a day later and left a day earlier. Been a while... :wry:
Little Rock was a different game initially, we had a slew of US Marshalls until it was obvious that Faubus was going to cooperate. The city of Little Rock did cooperate rather grudgingly... :wry:
The only lessons learned from Katrina were
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Greyhawk
...It is very different than NG deployment, but shouldn't have been all that startling in the wake of Katrina lessons learned.
that the news media are totally incompetent and that a dysfunctional city government plus a Governor playing party politics instead of asking for help (a lesson also learned in Florida after Hurricane Andrew) can mess up the works considerably. One can add that FEMA is fouled up -- no news there, they've always been. Patronage and political favor operations usually are.
Having lived through half a dozen Hurricanes and worked on the Army response to five both while in and as a DAC, the Katrina response was really pretty good. Better than Andrew, for sure. Helicopters launched from Eglin and Pensacola less than 45 minutes after the eye passed NOLA, the 1st Army stock and people, prepositioned at Camp Shelby, MS had to be moved when Katrina shifted east a bit but they were still in town in less than 12 hours. The USS Bataan even followed the eye upriver by a few hours...
Keep up the good work & links
Boondoggle
Prof. Guiora was LTC Guiora in the IDF's JAG Corps for nearly 20 years, so he knows whereof he speaks - also authored some other intelligent articles on LOAC issues. The US probably has more room to work in this area than the Israelis - The Israeli basic organic law (and the status of Gaza and the West Bank) place certain limitations on targeted kills. However, just because you have a hunting license, doesn't mean you kill everything in the woods. The difficult factual question is positive ID of the target. The legal issues revolve on how far to go down the infrastructure chain. At some point, the rules change from military to law enforcement (at least that is the current conventional wisdom).
Schmedlap
Outstanding. Another piece of evidence to silence the whiners' claim that combat units cannot collect adequate evidence, or handle detainees properly. Whether that is the highest and best use of their time is another issue; but, in the absence of specialized, gendarmerie-type units, who else will do it ?
Greyhawk
I never thought Pres. Bush would play the Man on the White Horse bit. But the John Yoo & Company opinions on "inherent presidential" powers in domestic, internal matters provided conspiracy theorists with great fodder.
The reality of an "on-call federal response force for natural or manmade emergencies and disasters, including terrorist attacks" seems connected to Joint Publication 3-40, Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction (10 June 2009), as one possible use.
Some of the issues are outlined in this seminar blurb (March 11, 2009). July article & Wiki. The Marines have had for a long time the much smaller Chemical Biological Incident Response Force (CBIRF; T.X. Hammes' unit).
Never, never shoot to wound ....
Amen. A problem with "shoot to wound" as a policy (besides the practical problem of placing a "wounding shot" in a stress situation) is that it gives ammunition to lawyers to make the argument (citing the policy) that a "wounding shot" should have been used, etc., etc.
My own little mantra is - Armed ? Hostile ? Center of Mass. I shot to stop the situation. In line with Michigan law, especially in home invasion situations, where there is a presumption in favor of the home owner. However you want to express it, the focus is on the threat and how it was ended.