Prosecution in Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher Case Hinge Murder Charge on Text Message
Eddie Gallagher enlisted in the US military in 1999 and served for 19 years with eight overseas deployments, including service in both the Iraq War and the War in Afghanistan. He was trained as a Corpsman, a sniper, and as an explosives expert. During his service, he was decorated for valor several times, including two Bronze Stars. He has received positive evaluations from his superiors within the SEALs and served as an instructor in the SEALs BUD/S program for recruits. Gallagher goes by the nickname “Blade” with his fellow frogmen.
He is on trial for the murder of a captured ISIS Jihadist.
By: KRISTINA WONG
Prosecutors in the case of Navy SEAL Special Operations Chief Eddie Gallagher appear to be hinging a murder charge of a wounded Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) fighter on a text message sent by Gallagher to a friend, according to Gallagher’s lawyer and local a news report.In his opening statement in a San Diego courtroom on Tuesday, Navy prosecutor Lt. Brian John presented a jury of five Marines and two sailors with a photo Gallagher had texted to fellow SEALs showing him holding a knife by a dead ISIS fighter with the message: “Good story behind this one. Got him with my hunting knife.”
“He stabbed that wounded ISIS fighter to death, and then he celebrated that stabbing,” John said, according to the Associated Press. “He celebrated that murder.”
Gallagher’s defense attorney and Navy veteran Tim Parlatore said in his opening statement that Gallagher’s text was an attempt at dark humor, and that the prosecution has no body, autopsy, or any forensic evidence to show a killing happened.
“Is this photo in poor taste? Probably. Is it evidence of murder? No,” he said. He noted there was no blood on the knife featured in the photo he texted to friends, or on himself, according to a Fox 5 San Diego.
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Parlatore said the younger SEALs — who are due to testify this week — videotaped and photographed nearly everything while they were overseas, yet somehow missed capturing the alleged murder.
Read the rest of the article here: Breitbart
Thanks to Wiki for the background.
Category: Afghanistan, Crime, Iraq, Isis, Legal, Military issues, Navy, Terror War
“…somehow missed capturing the alleged murder.”
Okay. But they know everything about it, right? Okay.
Murder on the battlefield? Its like handing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500.
I support giving surrendering/wounded uniformed enemy soldiers full quarter, but irregulars engaged in this type of guerrilla style tactics is a different story.
This is just one REMF’s opinion.
Ditto, from a non-REMF. I doubt much of the alleged abuse or murder of prisoners occurred in our ME ops. Even back in the Viet of the Nam, the military was quite sensitive to treating the enemy humanely. I once had to do and Article 32 investigation because and enemy POW claimed that one of the infantrymen who captured him hit him with a rifle butt. Although there was no evidence of a significant injury, I found there were no witnesses to prove it even happened.
As I said yesterday, it sounds more and more like a case built out of whole cloth and uncorroborated third party statements.
What a shit show.
I raised the possibility of a witch hunt early on, and got bloodied for casting aspersions on NCIS’s professionalism. I don’t see those commenting now.
What is, SEAL pups gonna get the caught in the perjury trap for $500 Alex
Like I said before, a lot of folk’s careers are in deep jeopardy and a BUNCH of folks massively dick stomped and Chief Gallagher ain’t one of them.
I hope he walks soon. VERY soon.
And like the dirty Dems in Washington, everyone here that did wrong gets exposed to the light of day.
And they get NAILED TO THE WALL.
YOU HEAR ME HILLARY, TWUNT!!??
From your lips, to the ears of God.
This entire affair serves to demonstrate how ill advised and hard headed Navy brass are. Rather than admit the obvious, they plow ahead blindly. I hope the defense blows them out of the water. Who really gives a shit if he killed someone who minutes earlier tried to kill American warriors. While the Unite States was a signatory to the Geneva Convention, last time I checked the Taliban were not.
“Damn the torpedoes…Full Speed Ahead!” It worked out well for ADM Farragut…for the current crop of Navy Brass?….Not too good!
lethimgo
I’m impressed, 5/77. Battle of Mobile Bay, 5 August, 1864.
Navy brass in this clusterfuck are a prime example of “ready, fire, aim.”
The individual in question was an illegal combatant under the Geneva Accords. Some time back, the accords were changed to allow for the summary execution without trial of such illegal combatants, because that category of person was not afforded any rights under the Geneva accords. Only our supplemental Law of Land Warfare, (also known by some as “lawfare”) roundly criticized by many under it as being a bit out of touch with reality, affords those criminals any level of civilized treatment which they don’t deserve in the first place.
BINGO!!
Fully agree with the rest of your statement, but Club Manager you are mixing up your battlefields: The Taliban are a somewhat organized religious group that took over Afghanistan, and shielded Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. ISIS (aka ISIL, aka Dae’ish) is bunch of fanatics that swept through Syria and Iraq and tried to establish a government and call it the new Caliphate. The dead kid in question claimed to be sympathetic to ISIS. And yes, neither group is a signatory of the Geneva Convention.
OJ was not immediately available for comment.
Eddie is getting hosed, for something. I hope he walks away from it and that the scurrilous sons of bitches who did this to him are called to task for their profligacies.
Albeit, there’s probably something going on underneath the story.
No body, no autopsy, no bloody knife and oddly no recording of the actual crime only a sarcastic text message to base this entire line of bullshit upon and hope to make a statement?
The cocksuckers behind this great wall of shit deserve to be buried under that wall when this is said and done.
This is the kind of case in the civilian world that defense lawyers are pretty comfortable with regarding their odds of success.
Who knows with the rat bastards behind this deal what will happen next, but it is my fervent desire to see Chief Gallagher a free man with full privilege and restored honor as is befitting a man who served 19 years before getting fucked by some dipshit political appointees.
The fuckers who signed off on this prosecution moving forward should be dismissed and stripped of all rank and privilege for being parties to this travesty.
The only fitting conclusion would be an exoneration, the Chief being selected for Senior and then proceeding to tell every…single…one of them to go FUCK THEMSELVES.
Somehow, someway, in a far off land Chief Gallagher removed EVERY SINGLE BIT OF BLOOD from his knife AND scabbard. Right….
As you said VOV, the entire case is hinged on ONE text msg.
“no hard evidence” is what casts it all into doubt.
The story the other day in the Navy Times, made it sound like the real culprit was the Head Medic (Scott I think, I may be mixing them up my memory is not what it used to be). Apparently he was doing some training on the recently deceased kid, showing how to do Tracheotomies, and other invasive airway procedures…wonder if they checked his knife, and camera? Oh, right no body!
The cocksuckers behind this great wall of shit deserve to be buried under that wall when this is said and done.
Kinda like Peter Strzok and Lisa Page and Robert Mueller and Andrew McCabe and James Comey and Rod Rosenstein, and Chelsea, Bill and Hillary Clinton and Obama and Loretta Lynch & Joe and Hunter Biden?
Yeah, I’m waiting.
Ditto!!!
I’d hate to see this warrior (and his wife and children) screwed out of his hard earned, well deserved military retired pay and benefits. If Chief Gallagher is convicted and all appeals fail, perhaps President Trump will grant him a pardon.
In my opinion, Trump has already telegraphed his feelings about this case by ordering Gallagher released from the restrictive confinement navy brass had ordered. Unless the testimony from those younger SEALs is absolutely damning, I’ll wager Gallagher walks. If he doesn’t then that presidential pardon is likely.
As I’ve mentioned here before, my one problem with Gallagher was that he had supposedly threatened family members of the SEALs who are to testify for the prosecution. However, since there has been nothing more reported on that, I believe it was likely fake news. Also, it is highly unlikely Trump would have ordered Gallagher released pre-trial had their been any validity to those charges and surely the Navy would have so advised the president.
I see nothing wrong with letting the Chief out of the brig. I thought that was roundly bullshit from the start. All that was was a CO with an obvious unprofessional hardon for the guy. All Trump did was try to ,fix a fuckup. Kinda his job as CINC since no one else in the fucking Navy was interested in doing so.
This case has smelled fishy from the git-go, IMO.
Having read the Breitbart article, of the many eyebrow raisers, this one really smacked me in the nose:
” … Gallagher’s subordinates conspired against him because he brought them closer to combat than they wanted and “didn’t want to be exposed to enemy fire.””
Wait, what!!??
Just what did these yo-yos think being a Navy snake-eater meant? Standing around, looking pretty in their shiny new tridents, and picking up on the pretty girls?
If this charge proves to be true, ie, they were afraid because the Chief was taking them into knife range, and this murder charge is a big nothing burger with a side of political bias, heads need to roll. I would hope for literally, but will settle for figuratively.
I wonder, can the Navy take the tridents from those snowflakes? Reduce ’em to E-1 and boot ’em with a dishonorable? Keelhauled, too.
They impugned the Honor of Chief Gallagher, and for that they must pay through the nose. IMO.
I agree 100% this has always looked like to me that the AOIC had a problem with the Chief and gathered his disgruntled sailors to mutinize against the Chief. Hope Eddie is exonerated and set free to retire – write his book, sell the book to Peter Berg for the movie and live happily ever after. As far as NCIS goes what a bunch of fruit cakes and they should be prosecuted for what they did to Eddie and his family. Dragging his boys outside in their underwear to be ridiculed by the neighborhood while they shackled Eddie up.
“Dragging his boys outside in their underwear to be ridiculed by the neighborhood while they shackled Eddie up.”
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, OVER!!??
If accurate, several someones are in dire need of some good old fashioned Barracks Discipline, with extreme prejudice.
Since this post is about lawers and legal stuff and the MOT isn’t up yet, I thought you all might want to know what is happening to our fave creepy porn lawer (CPL). Mr. Avenatti is now subject to a petition by the Cali State Bar Trial Counsel’s office seeking to place him on interim suspension from practicing law. The petition and all it’s attachments are available at the State Bar website you only have to pull up Avenatti’s page and the docs are there in PDF form, including attachments of both the 36 count California indictment and the New Yawk indictment in those respective federal courts.
After reading those docs, I reiterate my prior prediction that he is going to be convicted of multiple counts of embezzlement of client funds, bank fraud, bankruptcy fraud, tax collection evasion, and willful failure to file tax returns. He will then be permanently disbarred. There is also a warning on the Bar’s website to the public, so only the most TDS deranged Orange Man Bad loonies will consider hiring him until the suspension order is issued.
Let’s also not forget that Avenatti was evicted from his office suite due to non payment of rent as well. Was His extortion scheme on Nike a plot to get fast money? I love watching Karma make her rounds!
If you read all the docs attached to the petition, it is obvious he was constantly robbing peter client to pay paul creditor. He turned his law practice into the litigation lotto version of a Ponzi scheme. In the case one client, he was promising to “loan” him money that CPL intended to collect from the next installment payment of the client’s settlement. In other words, he was going to loan the client what was really the client’s own money from the settlement(which CPL falsely claimed was being held up). But CPL being the stand-up guy he is, said he would only charge him 8% interest on the “loan.” CPL has likely been doing this for many years–stealing settlement funds from one client to pay another client or creditor.
I left out the extortion from my prediction because that is not as easy to prove; it doesn’t appear to have the irrefutable chain of financial documents that prove the other crimes.
So, he will likely receive
(Puts on sunglasses)
CPL Punishment
Yes, it will be administered by his cellie, Bubba, and the rest of his cell block. After he is sentenced to 20 to 30 years in the federal pen, I think the TAH gang should take up a collection to get him that economy cell block sized tub of “I Can’t Believe Its Not K-Y.”
What is so ironic is that Stormy didn’t ever suspect when he was screwing her, it would end up costing her $300K from her book deal.
The Ancient Law : As you have done, so shall it be done unto you.
Lost that purty airplane, too.
I had forgotten about that until now, was it seized or repoed?
Seized.
By William La Jeunesse, Paulina Dedaj
Fox News
I can’t wait to see what happens to him next, Karma NEVER pulls punches! He’s not only facing disbarment in CA, he’s also been alleged to have stolen clients’ settlement money as well. I wonder how soon he’ll be the “property” of Bubba & Thor in the greybar Hilton?
There are asset forfeiture counts in each of his indictments. The feds can seize everything he owns that they can trace to any of he money he stole from clients or the proceeds of his fraudulent bank loans. When he leaves the federal PITA prison in about 2045, likely the only thing he will own is an orange jump suit.
It couldn’t happen to a more deserving POS of a CPL!
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! Let CPL reap what he has sown!!
Avenatti is indeed getting all that he deserves at this moment….here’s hoping he learns some hard lessons about honesty and karma.
I never wish anyone harm, but I am in agreement with Mr. Clarence Darrow, …but I have read some obituary notices with great satisfaction.
I hope not only that Chief Gallagher gets acquitted but that his accusers are forced to answer for what they did to him, his family and his career.
Some sworn statement have already been remembered differently than before. The perjury trap awaits.
Currently reading Red Platoon from Clinton Romesha, the MOH awardee following that clusterfuck at COP Keating.
I also found out today that one of my good friends was at that battle, he explained much of the actions of that day to me while I sat there dumbfounded and just completely impressed with his memory of the firefight that took place that day.
We lost several good men that day and we also found out just how hard these warriors fight to uphold the things we too often take for granted.
I simply cannot see how killing a fighter that is out to kill you in any manner that they can should be a crime in the first place.
A dead ISIS Fighter is a good ISIS fighter….
More symptoms of the oblowme and larsy-boi school of vapid thought and narcissism gone wild…
It’s yet another great read.
God Bless all those that fight our wars for us while we sit in the comfort of our homes.
Lawfare
By abusing Law, they seek to geld the US Armed forces.
I am ever so grateful Congress delivered, and W signed, that conditional Declaration of War, that if someone tries to haul a US serviceperson before the “international criminal court” we get to respond … unkindly.
A shining moment in US legislation. Bravo.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Protection_Act
Hmm. When zer0 let the Iranians size US sailors, did they run them through one of their Kangaroo courts?
Because if they did, Trump might be holding a much bigger stick than the War Powers act. And he knows how to game laws. Bigly.
Popcorn?
Well that SEAL pup just $hit the bed about plugging the breathing tube.