Soldiers Face Charges Over Secret “Kill Team”

Posted on by

Andrew Holmes, Michael Wagnon, Jeremy Morlock and Adam Winfield are four of the five Stryker soldiers who face murder charges. Photograph: Public Domain

 

GUARDIAN– Twelve American soldiers face charges over a secret “kill team” that allegedly blew up and shot Afghan civilians at random and collected their fingers as trophies.

Five of the soldiers are charged with murdering three Afghan men who were allegedly killed for sport in separate attacks this year. Seven others are accused of covering up the killings and assaulting a recruit who exposed the murders when he reported other abuses, including members of the unit smoking hashish stolen from civilians.

In one of the most serious accusations of war crimes to emerge from the Afghan conflict, the killings are alleged to have been carried out by members of a Stryker infantry brigade based in Kandahar province in southern Afghanistan.

According to investigators and legal documents, discussion of killing Afghan civilians began after the arrival of Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs at forward operating base Ramrod last November. Other soldiers told the army’s criminal investigation command that Gibbs boasted of the things he got away with while serving in Iraq and said how easy it would be to “toss a grenade at someone and kill them”.

One soldier said he believed Gibbs was “feeling out the platoon”.

Investigators said Gibbs, 25, hatched a plan with another soldier, Jeremy Morlock, 22, and other members of the unit to form a “kill team”. While on patrol over the following months they allegedly killed at least three Afghan civilians. According to the charge sheet, the first target was Gul Mudin, who was killed “by means of throwing a fragmentary grenade at him and shooting him with a rifle”, when the patrol entered the village of La Mohammed Kalay in January.

Morlock and another soldier, Andrew Holmes, were on guard at the edge of a poppy field when Mudin emerged and stopped on the other side of a wall from the soldiers. Gibbs allegedly handed Morlock a grenade who armed it and dropped it over the wall next to the Afghan and dived for cover. Holmes, 19, then allegedly fired over the wall.

Later in the day, Morlock is alleged to have told Holmes that the killing was for fun and threatened him if he told anyone.

Read full article about the Secret Kill Team.

© COPYRIGHT GUARDIAN, 2010

Leave a Reply

RELATED NEWS

  • Jeremy Scahill Talks About “Dirty Wars”
  • Agitprop: How the DoD Promotes Its War
  • AFRICOM: America’s Continued Dominion
  • A Look Back: Ike’s Last Call For Military Restraint
  • FOREIGN POLICY

  • Empire Files Podcast: A Russian Anti-War Perspective on Ukraine
  • Empire Files: Ukraine: Questions for the US Anti-War Movement w/ Abby Martin & Brian Becker
  • Media Roots Radio: Hollywood Gets Tough On Putin, Ukraine Scorched Earth Info War, Banning Russia
  • Media Roots Radio: RIP RT America, The End of An Era
  • Media Roots Radio: Revenge of the Kagans, DOD’s 11 Ukrainian Bio Labs, 60 Mins Targeted Individuals, Havana Reviews
  • Media Roots Radio: Fog of Cold War, Sitting Duck Op, Doomsday Clock 100 Seconds to Midnight
  • Media Roots Radio: US Can’t Quit Azov, Biden Blinked, Manifesting War & Marring Beijing 2022
  • Empire Files: Oliver Stone & Abby Martin: Down the JFK Rabbit Hole
  • Empire Files: Israel Gets Georgia to Strip Free Speech Rights (Again)
  • Media Roots Radio: Biden Wags the Dog on Ukraine, Alt-Media Race to Bottom & Cops Play Into Crime Panic w/ Yasha Levine
  • Empire Files: The War Profiteer Who Stole Christmas
  • Empire Files: Native Hawaiians Fight US Navy for Polluting Island’s Water
  • Empire Files: Navy Abandons Victims of Red Hill Fuel Leak
  • Empire Files Podcast: Interview with Red Hill Frontline Fighter: Navy Imperiling Life on O’ahu
  • Media Roots Radio: The Wheel of Winter’s Darkness & Smallpox Bioterror Scares Pt 1 of 2