AP is running After days of secrecy, US suspect in Afghan killings ID'd, a father of 2 with arrest record and Neighbors say Afghan attack suspect was family man.

The arrest charges were (quotes from each story):

But court records show Bales was arrested at a Tacoma, Wash., hotel in 2002 for investigation of assault on a woman he dated before he married his wife, his lawyer, John Henry Browne, confirmed. Bales pleaded not guilty, underwent 20 hours of anger management counseling and the case was dismissed, according to court records. A separate hit-and-run charge was dismissed in a nearby town's municipal court three years ago, according to records.
Bales completed 20 hours of anger-management counseling following a 2002 arrest at a Tacoma hotel for investigation of assault. Browne said the case involved a woman other than Bales' wife, whom he married in 2005.

Tacoma Municipal court administrator Yvonne Pettus provided a copy of the court docket, but said clerks could not immediately locate the case file, which is either in archives or destroyed. The docket shows that Bales pleaded not guilty, underwent the 20 hours of anger management treatment, and the case was dismissed.

Records also associated with Bales show that in 2009 he had a hit-and-run charge dismissed in municipal court in Sumner.
The neighbors had this to say (quotes from each story):

...Neighbors described him Friday as good-natured and warm, and recalled seeing him playing outside the family's modern split-level with his children, ages 3 and 4.
...
Neighbors, though, recalled a man who was stoic about his time at war and didn't let on much.

"He always had a good attitude about being in the service," said Kassie Holland, who lives next door. "He was never really angry about about it. When I heard him talk, he said ... `yeah, that's my job. That's what I do.' He never expressed a lot of emotion toward it."

Holland called Bales kind-hearted around the neighborhood. "I can't believe it was him," she said. "There were no signs. It's really sad. I don't want to believe that he did it."
Neighbors of a Washington state man accused of gunning down 16 Afghan women and children in a nighttime rampage describe him as a family man who was "just one of the guys."
...
"I just can't believe Bob's the guy who did this," said Paul Wohlberg, a next-door neighbor who said his family was friendly with the Bales family. "A good guy got put in the wrong place at the wrong time. ... I never thought something like this would happen to him."

Wohlberg described Bales as a "good guy _ just one of the guys."
...

Kassie Holland, who lives next door, said she would often see Bales playing with his two kids and the family together at the modern split-level home.

"My reaction is that I'm shocked," Holland said. "I can't believe it was him. There were no signs. It's really sad. I don't want to believe that he did it.

"He always had a good attitude about being in the service. He was never really angry about it," she said. "When I heard him talk, he said, it seemed like, `Yeah, that's my job. That's what I do.' He never expressed a lot of emotion toward it."
...

"I kind of sympathize for him, being gone, being sent over there four times," said Beau Britt, who lives across the street. "I can understand he's probably quite wracked mentally, so I just hope that things are justified in court. I hope it goes OK."
...
Alissa Cinkovich, 45, has lived in the neighborhood for seven years, and said it was scary that Bales had been living nearby.

"I would like to think he just went off his rocker because of the war," Cinkovich said.
Prior to Astan deployment, Bales was at the NTC:

Spc. Ryan Hallock
In this Aug. 23, 2011 Defense Video & Imagery Distribution System photo, Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, right, participates in an exercise at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif. Five days after an attack on Afghan villagers killed 16 civilians, a senior U.S. official identified the shooter in that attack as Bales. The man at left is unidentified. (AP Photo/DVIDS, Spc. Ryan Hallock)


I don't know which way this might cut.

Regards

Mike