Honor, murder and "the law".

[120mm]

Finally, I think I can get back to the issue I think 120mm raised - what happens when one law collides with another law. Say, the Marine Honor Code and the UCMJ, as in the Tom Cruise movie, A Few Good Men, where from a trial lawyer's standpoint they got the military judge right and not much else. Anyway, it does present the outcome of collisions between laws, where there is also a collision of various ideologies - as presented by the Hollywood types who wrote the script.

I guess in my highly idealistic world, the honorable person breaks the law and then uncomplainingly accepts punishment, therefore satisfying both "honor" and "the law."

I think a very important question we need to ask ourselves, is "What impact is our insistence on forcing a foreign concept of "law" on a society where we are trying to fight a counterinsurgency have on our strategic goals?"

[slapout9]

I think a very important question we need to ask ourselves, is "What impact is our insistence on forcing a foreign concept of "law" on a society where we are trying to fight a counterinsurgency have on our strategic goals?"

That is a good question!

PS-If the HTT member has a good attorney I think he stands a fair chance of either being acquitted or maybe just get probation and an agreement not to become involved in HTT anymore.

[Beelzebubalicious]

Man who killed Afghan seeks sentencing leniency
He says he was reacting to horrific attack on friend
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
By Bruce Alpert
Washington bureau

[jmm99]

Link to article from SWJ Blog thread.

Ex-contractor given probation in slaying of Afghan
By MATTHEW BARAKAT – 2 hours ago

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A former military contractor was sentenced Friday to probation for shooting and killing a handcuffed prisoner in Afghanistan.
...
Loyd's family has been among Ayala's strongest supporters. Loyd's mother, Patricia Ward, noted in a letter to the judge that several of Loyd's friends offered to serve Ayala's time for him.

"His reaction was perfectly normal in my mind," wrote Ward, who said that she likely would have done the same thing.

Ayala's lawyers said his experience, rather than steeling him to keep his emotions in check, left him with latent combat stress that reared up as he dealt with the emotions and adrenaline of the attack on Loyd and the struggle to subdue Salam. At one point in the struggle Salam had grabbed the barrel of a soldier's rifle.

"Without knowing it, Mr. Ayala was vulnerable to errors in judgment under combat conditions" because of the accumulated combat-related stress, wrote federal public defender Michael Nachmanoff.

Same defense argument as in Anatomy of a Murder - with similar result. No complaint from this lawyer (see Slap's post #20 & JMM's #35 in this thread).

[120mm]

While I was somewhat surprised by probation, I'll take it.

Buy this judge a beer or whatever for what to me is amazingly straightforward "justice".

[jmm99]

Judge Claude M. Hilton is a US District judge on "senior status" (semi-retired) - something like JMM's status as a "senior lawyer"; except he makes more money than I do.

Seriously, from Judge Hilton's official bio, Wiki1 and Wiki2, a fair inference is that he is center-right to the extent he has any political slant.

Of more importance to this case, is the fact that Judge Hilton was assigned to the FISA court (2000-2007) - so, he knows more about classified stuff re: AQ-Taliban than the average bear. He also knows something about Astan & Pstan - and the AQ-Taliban types there - from the public record:

Wednesday, December 03, 2008
From Paintball to Mumbai
by Terry Jeffrey

The defiant words a former third-grade teacher spat at a judge in Alexandria, Va., in April are more poignant now that sources in the Indian and U.S. governments are saying they believe Lashkar-e-Taiba (LET), a Pakistan-based terrorist group, was behind the mass murder in Mumbai, India, last week.

"What government was supposed to be intimidated by my actions?" Ali Asad Chandia asked U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton at the April hearing where the judge reconfirmed Chandia's 15-year prison sentence, according to The Associated Press. "Do you think the government of India will feel intimidated by a few boxes of paintballs?"

Chandia taught at an Islamic school in the Maryland suburbs before being convicted in 2006 of "providing material support to terrorists." .... [much more in article]

Since I don't know Judge Hilton, I can't say that he is a part of the beer-drinking crowd of "old-fashioned redneck male types who believe in the protection of women - and in a little old-fashioned populist justice" (see post #41 above) - but, I'd like to think so.