US soldier suspected in Afghanistan massacre identified

[smile72]

Updated at 11:10 ET: U.S. officials told NBC News on Friday that the soldier suspected of shooting 16 civilians in Afghanistan is Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales.

Bales, 38, was deployed to Afghanistan in December with the 3rd Stryker Brigade, based out of Joint Base Lewis-McChord, south of Tacoma, Wash., the officials said.

Bales arrived late Friday at a U.S. military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., where he will be held in a solitary cell, the Army said. He was flown in from Kuwait, officials said.

"It's a tragedy," Gen. David Rodriguez, commanding general of U.S. Army Forces Command, said at the base, home to about 37,000 Army and 6,000 Air Force personnel. "Everyone knows this doesn't reflect our standards or values, nor does it reflect the soldiers that perform here and overseas. They are shocked, just as we are."

Bales, a married father of two, has a clean record of conduct, the officials said. He joined the military after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

"He felt it was his calling to stand up for the us after 911 and then decided to make his career the military," said his civilian attorney, John Henry Browne, who spoke to Bales on Thursday night.

Bales had been deployed to Iraq three times before going to Afghanistan. While in Iraq, officials say, he suffered a traumatic head injury in a crash and also suffered a foot injury in a separate incident. In Afghanistan, Bales reportedly saw a friend lose a leg.

What role those incidents may have played, if any, in the shootings, remains unclear. Browne says the soldier may suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Browne also said the soldier never expected a fourth deployment.

"Overnight he was told he was going back and he told his family and told me that he did what he was ordered to do 'cause he was a soldier," Browne said.

Officials are investigating reports that Bales may have been drinking before he left the base in Afghanistan on the night of the killings over the weekend. Among the dead were nine children.

Bales, a native of Ohio, has been based at Lewis-McChord his entire career. He and his family live close to Lake Tapps, a reservoir not far from the base, and have family roots in western Washington. Bales' wife is said to be an executive at a Seattle-area company.

Brown said the suspect's family will remain on base for the foreseeable future for their own protection.

The Army, in a statement obtained by NBC News, said Bales will be held in pre-trial confinement at the Midwest Joint Regional Correctional Facility at Fort Leavenworth.
The Army described the prison as a state-of-the-art, medium/minimum custody facility for pre-trial confinement and military sentences of up to five years.

Also located on Fort Leavenworth is the Disciplinary Barracks housing military inmates sentenced to more than five years.

Bales will be in special housing in his own cell and not in a four-person bay, the Army said. He will be afforded time outside the cell for hygiene and recreational purposes. He may have religious support.

The correctional facility has a 464-bed capacity, but the Army said the inmate population is ever-changing. However, the number of inmates in pre-trial confinement is typically around one dozen, the Army said.

Source:MSNBC
http://worldnews.msn...acre-identified

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

 

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Your feeling is entirely justified.

 

[BlueStar]

Should have been tried and punished in Afghanistan, by Afgans.

 

[smile72]

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Your feeling is entirely justified.

I know our government likes to condemn people who commit these acts unless they're our soldiers then they like to save their asses.

 

[Thomas83Lin]

I feel sorry for his family, but most importantly feel for the women and children that lost their lives. I doubt they will let him off easy

 

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

I know our government likes to condemn people who commit these acts unless they're our soldiers then they like to save their asses.

In my opinion it is safe to say that the US government has not been "ours" for quite a long time.

 

[Thesolcity]

-Snip-

Source:MSNBC
http://worldnews.msn...acre-identified

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Bradley Manning AFAIK was completely sane at the time he committed his actions and therefore is legally responsible, however his treatment was/is inhumane if that's what you meant. This man, meanwhile, is suspected of being inflicted with post traumatic stress. A very real and scary thing to be inflicted with if you're a soldier.

 

[BlueStar]

Yes, every time we hear what he did they have to hammer home "after apparently suffering a mental breakdown" as if it's punctuation and list that a friend of his got injured, that he'd had a hard time in Iraq etc. The Virginia Tech shooter was clearly going through a meltdown but you don't hear his crime as "The student who gunned down 32 other students after apparently suffering a mental breakdown" Nor when someone blows up a bus full of people or shoots up a Mumbai hotel do you see the media coverage being about how bad the person who did it felt when his brother was blown up by an American missile or whatever, certainly not more than you hear about the actual victims.

Can you imagine if an Afghan solider or policeman visiting the US slaughtered a load of American children and the Afghan authorities wanted to fly him out of the County and try him there, talking about what a tough time he'd had and how he was kind of a victim too?

All the dubiously convicted black guys with a mental age of 12 who get executed for possibly shooting one adult in a botched robbery, and there is not a snowflakes chance in hell of this guy getting the death penalty for multiple child murder.

 

[smile72]

-Snip-

Source:MSNBC
http://worldnews.msn...acre-identified

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Bradley Manning AFAIK was completely sane at the time he committed his actions and therefore is legally responsible, however his treatment was/is inhumane if that's what you meant. This man, meanwhile, is suspected of being inflicted with post traumatic stress. A very real and scary thing to be inflicted with if you're a soldier.

That doesn't excuse what he did.

 

[Thesolcity]

-Snip-

Source:MSNBC
http://worldnews.msn...acre-identified

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Bradley Manning AFAIK was completely sane at the time he committed his actions and therefore is legally responsible, however his treatment was/is inhumane if that's what you meant. This man, meanwhile, is suspected of being inflicted with post traumatic stress. A very real and scary thing to be inflicted with if you're a soldier.

That doesn't excuse what he did.

Mental dementia is a legal excuse which (with scientific reasoning behind it) states you are not/could not be responsible for your actions because your brain isn't working correctly, which also wasn't his fault. I feel for the Afghan families but the most we can hope to do is get this guy in a mental bin. Unless you have a better way of dealing with the mentally incapable? (Choose carefully).

 

[smile72]

-Snip-

Source:MSNBC
http://worldnews.msn...acre-identified

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Bradley Manning AFAIK was completely sane at the time he committed his actions and therefore is legally responsible, however his treatment was/is inhumane if that's what you meant. This man, meanwhile, is suspected of being inflicted with post traumatic stress. A very real and scary thing to be inflicted with if you're a soldier.

That doesn't excuse what he did.

Mental dementia is a legal excuse which (with scientific reasoning behind it) states you are not/could not be responsible for your actions because your brain isn't working correctly, which also wasn't his fault. I feel for the Afghan families but the most we can hope to do is get this guy in a mental bin. Unless you have a better way of dealing with the mentally incapable? (Choose carefully).

He was completely sane and as far as I'm concerned anything lower than life in prison is an injustice.

 

[kupo3000]

What boggles the mind is why they sent him again to another war ridden area, knowing full well about his head injury and PTSD.

 

[Thesolcity]

-Snip-

Source:MSNBC
http://worldnews.msn...acre-identified

I have a sickening feeling in my stomach that he will either walk free or get a very short sentence. And Bradley Manning will get life.

Bradley Manning AFAIK was completely sane at the time he committed his actions and therefore is legally responsible, however his treatment was/is inhumane if that's what you meant. This man, meanwhile, is suspected of being inflicted with post traumatic stress. A very real and scary thing to be inflicted with if you're a soldier.

That doesn't excuse what he did.

Mental dementia is a legal excuse which (with scientific reasoning behind it) states you are not/could not be responsible for your actions because your brain isn't working correctly, which also wasn't his fault. I feel for the Afghan families but the most we can hope to do is get this guy in a mental bin. Unless you have a better way of dealing with the mentally incapable? (Choose carefully).

He was completely sane and as far as I'm concerned anything lower than life in prison is an injustice.

Well wait for a report. If he's really suffering from PTSD, we'll know.

 

[playallday]

.

 

[smile72]

Should have been tried and punished in Afghanistan, by Afgans.

I agree.

 

[omgpwn666]

I saw this on the news the other day, horrible story...

 

[ShadowSoldier]

Umm....

"Officials are investigating reports that Bales may have been drinking before he left the base in Afghanistan on the night of the killings"

Why do they have access to liquor? Sure, bring porn, strippers, hookers, weed and everything else, but why something that makes you lose focus of who you are and can change you to do some fucked up shit. On top of that, why even have liquor near someone who possibly has PTSD, and give him a gun?