Family of slain Marine doubts Haditha reports

updated 8:16 p.m. ET May 31, 2006

EL PASO, Texas - Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas’ bedroom is nothing short of a shrine to the Marine whose death in an Iraqi roadside explosion preceded a firefight that now is the focus of a criminal investigation.

His dress blue uniform, complete with his ceremonial Marine Corps sword, hangs in a cherry wood display case. His medals, including the Purple Heart awarded after his death, sit below his jacket.

On one wall is a Marine Comfort Quilt, a blanket sewn by strangers who heard of the 20-year-old’s November death in Haditha, Iraq. Opposite that is a tribute banner signed by the Marines he fought with — from the unit now the target of a high-profile probe into the killings of more than 20 Iraqis, including unarmed women and children, after Terrazas was killed.

Exactly what happened that day remains unclear. Miguel Terrazas’ father, Martin, said the Marines his son fought with told him that after the car bomb exploded the Marines took a defensive position around his son’s battered vehicle. Insurgents immediately started shooting from nearby buildings, and the insurgents were using women and children as human shields, Martin said he was told.

The Marines shot back because “it was going to be them or” the insurgents, Martin said of what his son’s fellow Marines briefly described to him.

“It’s very hard for me, I don’t even listen to the news,” Terrazas said of reports of the mass killings.

‘Those Marines just did their job’
Marine officials initially gave the same story, that 15 civilians were killed Nov. 19 in the explosion and a subsequent firefight that also killed eight insurgents. Several months later Time magazine and then Arab television stations obtained a videotape of the scene, showing the bodies of women and children. The video, Iraqis’ accounts of the day and other emerging details sparked a criminal investigation.

Terrazas said he has met with many from his son’s unit who told him they did only what was necessary to survive. He wouldn’t say when he spoke with them.

“Those Marines just did their job,” he said. “Some of these kids were saying, ‘We have to live with it.’”

Former Marine Luis Terrazas, Miguel’s uncle, said Marines are trained to stay cool under pressure.

“Jarheads don’t just go out and kill because they get frustrated,” Luis Terrazas said. “Their training is exquisite. It just doesn’t make sense.”

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