Murder Charges Dropped Against Marine

CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. May 26, 2005 — The Marine Corps dropped murder charges Thursday against an officer accused of riddling two Iraqis with bullets and hanging a warning sign on their corpses as a grisly example to other suspected insurgents.

Autopsies conducted on the Iraqis’ exhumed bodies backed 2nd Lt. Ilario Pantano’s assertion that he shot them in self-defense after the men disobeyed his instructions and made a menacing move toward him, Marine officials said. [...]

The two Iraqis were killed during an April 2004 search outside a suspected terrorist hideout in Mahmudiyah, Iraq.

Prosecutors said Pantano, 33, intended to make an example of the men by shooting them 60 times and hanging a sign over their bodies “No better friend, no worse enemy,” a Marine slogan. Pantano did not deny hanging the sign or shooting the men repeatedly. (source)

I’ve never been a soldier, so I suppose it’s valid to say that I don’t know what I’m talking about. I also was not there, thank God. But, how can you justify shooting someone 60 times if you were just defending yourself? And then, on top of that, you hang a sign on the bodies that says, “No better friend, no worse enemy,” a Marine slogan. What the hell is that about? Do you have to be a hard-ass marine to understand that? He sounds like a sadistic bastard to me.

It’s doesn’t seem quite right to me. And, this seems like the marines covering for their own. I suppose I’ll be accused of being “unpatriotic”, or some nonsense, but will the United States ever be accountable for any damn thing we do to these people?