Accused troops: We were under orders to kill

updated 4:56 p.m. ET July 21, 2006

EL PASO, Texas - Four U.S. soldiers accused of murdering suspected insurgents during a raid in Iraq said they were under orders to “kill all military age males,” according to sworn statements obtained by The Associated Press.

The soldiers first took some of the men into custody because they were using two women and a toddler as human shields. They shot three of the men after the women and child were safe and say the men attacked them.

“The ROE (rule of engagement) was to kill all military age males on Objective Murray,” Staff Sgt. Raymond L. Girouard told investigators, referring to the target by its code name.

That target, an island on a canal in the northern Salhuddin province, was believed to be an al-Qaida training camp. The soldiers said officers in their chain of command gave them the order and explained that special forces had tried before to target the island and had come under fire from insurgents.

Girouard, Spc. William B. Hunsaker, Pfc. Corey R. Clagett, and Spc. Juston R. Graber are charged with murder and other offenses in the shooting deaths of three of the men during the May 9 raid.

Girouard, Hunsaker and Clagett are also charged with obstruction of justice for allegedly threatening to kill another soldier if he told authorities what happened.

‘They did it admirably’
In sworn statements obtained this week by the AP, Girouard, Hunsaker, Clagett, and a witness, Sgt. Leonel Lemus, told Army investigators they were ordered to attack an island in northern Salahuddin province on May 9 and kill anti-Iraqi fighters with ties to al-Qaida.

All four soldiers charged are members of the Fort Campbell, Ky.-based 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. They have been jailed in Kuwait since their June arrests. Their first hearing is Aug. 1 near Tikrit, Iraq.

Michael Waddington, Hunsaker’s civilian lawyer, said his client followed orders and killed the detainees in self-defense after he and Clagett were attacked.

“They did (their job) honorably, they did it admirably,” said Paul Bergrin, Clagett’s civilian attorney. “If they did want to kill these men, they could have and been within the rules of engagement.”

Officers from their unit initially cleared the soldiers of wrongdoing. Charges were filed when witnesses changed their testimony after repeated interviews with Army investigators, Bergrin said.

Military declines to comment
Reached by e-mail in Iraq, Girouard’s Army lawyer, Capt. Theodore Miller, declined to comment because the investigation was continuing.

An Army prosecutor, also deployed to Iraq, did not respond to an e-mail request for comment.

Army spokesman Sheldon Smith asked that a request for comment be e-mailed to him in Virginia. He did not immediately respond.

Military officials have released few details of the case.

But statements from Girouard, Hunsaker and Clagett describe a tense early morning scene, with soldiers immediately opening fire on buildings.

Girouard told investigators he expected he and his comrades would immediately be attacked when they landed on the island. Intelligence officials had warned that at least 20 al-Qaida operatives were hiding there.

But it was only once the men moved to the northern half of the island that they found anyone, Girouard said. He said he and others shot and killed a man they spied in a window in one building and then rushed into a house where they found three other men hiding behind two women.

A fifth man, holding a 2-year-old girl in front of him, later came out of another building, Girouard and Hunsaker told investigators.

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