Court-martial sought for Bales

JOINT BASE LEWIS-McCHORD, Wash. – Army prosecutors on Tuesday asked an investigative officer to recommend a death penalty court-martial for a staff sergeant accused of killing 16 Afghan villagers in a predawn rampage, saying that Staff Sgt. Robert Bales committed “heinous and despicable crimes.”

Prosecutors made their closing arguments after a week of testimony in the preliminary hearing. Prosecutors say Bales, 39, slipped away from his remote base at Camp Belambay in southern Afghanistan to attack two villages early on March 11. Among the dead were nine children.

The slayings drew such angry protests that the U.S. temporarily halted combat operations in Afghanistan, and it was three weeks before American investigators could reach the crime scenes.

“Terrible, terrible things happened,” prosecutor Maj. Rob Stelle said. “That is clear.”

Stelle cited statements Bales made after he was apprehended, saying that they demonstrated “a clear memory of what he had done and consciousness of wrongdoing.”

Several soldiers testified that Bales returned to the base alone just before dawn, covered in blood, and that he made incriminating statements such as, “I thought I was doing the right thing.”

An attorney for Bales argued there’s not enough information to move forward with the court-martial.

“There are a number of questions that have not been answered so far in this investigation,” attorney Emma Scanlan told the investigating officer overseeing the preliminary hearing.

Scanlan said it’s still unknown what Bales’ state of mind was the evening of the killings.

An Army criminal investigations command special agent had testified last week that Bales tested positive for steroids three days after the killings, and other soldiers testified that Bales had been drinking the evening of the massacre.

“We’ve heard that Sgt. Bales was lucid, coherent and responsive,” Scanlan said in her closing argument. “We don’t know what it means to be on alcohol, steroids and sleeping aids.”

The investigating officer said Tuesday that he would have a written recommendation by the end of the week, but that is just the start of the process. That recommendation goes next to the brigade command, and the ultimate decision would be made by the three-star general on the base. There’s no clear sense of how long that could take before a decision is reached on whether to proceed to a court-martial trial.

If a court-martial takes place, it would be held at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, and witnesses would be flown in from Afghanistan.

The military hasn’t executed a service member since 1961.