Soldier gets 25 years for Iraqi detainee's murder

updated 9:46 p.m. ET Feb. 28, 2009

FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. - A military jury in Kentucky has sentenced an Army officer to 25 years in prison for shooting and killing an Iraqi detainee during an interrogation.

A spokesman for the 101st Airborne Division says the panel sentenced 1st Lt. Michael Behenna of Edmond, Okla., on Saturday. Behenna was convicted a day earlier of murder and assault but acquitted of making a false statement.

Behenna faced up to life in prison on the murder conviction.

Behenna testified he was trying to defend himself when he shot Ali Mansour Mohammed and that the detainee reached for his gun in a secluded railroad culvert near Beiji, Iraq, in May.

The 101st Airborne Division spokesman Maj. Johnpaul Arnold says the defense has filed a mistrial motion.

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