Writ sought from ACCA in Stryker Brigade case; ACCA stays proceedings and issues show cause order
Reuters reports here that one of the accured in the “Ramrod Five/Stryker Brigade” cases has filed a petition for extraordinary relief with ACCA seeking a writ unsealing apparently grisly photographic evidence for use at the Article 32.
Reuters reports:
According to the appeals court petition, Holmes is effectively being denied his constitutional right to a public trial because defense attorneys cannot cross-examine military investigators in open court about photographs entered as prosecution evidence but kept under seal.
The defense maintains the photos in question are unclassified and would exonerate Holmes by demonstrating the victim was not killed by the kind of automatic weapon Holmes was armed with at the time.
h/t Phil Cave’s Court-Martial Trial Practice blog
And thanks to Snuffy in the comments for informing us that ACCA has issued a stay and a show cause order.
You can’t say “Ramrod” without making me think of Wings Hauser’s characer in Vice Squad.
ACCA issued a stay and a show cause order on writ today.
ACCA’s gonna restore some sense to this whole deal. How can any Soldier be prosecuted for killing the enemy in a war zone?
If it’s not combat-related, it’s murder.
The same way we prosecute soldiers who have no uniform or country and don’t follow the laws of war.
Anon 2110,
You don’t know what combat is. If it’s in Afghanistan, it’s combat, plain and simple.
@colt 45, it’s combat, except when it’s a 15 year old boy engaged in battle and in the process happens to kill an American. Then, it’s murder. Ur-rah for American exceptionalism.