| Ehren Watada |
Article Index for Ehren |
Information AboutEhren Watada |
Ehren Watada (born '', June 20 2006 His Court-martial ended in a Mistrial on February 7 , 2007 . A second court-martial, originally scheduled to begin July 23 , 2007 has been postponed until October 9 , 2007 . BACKGROUND Ehren K. Watada was born in , then transferred in his sophomore year to Kalani High School , where he played cornerback on the varsity football team. An Eagle Scout , Watada graduated from Hawaii Pacific University in 2003 with a B.A. in Finance. Officer at Fort Lewis calls Iraq war illegal, refuses order to go Instead of Iraq, a battle all his own Watada joined the US Army after the war in Iraq had begun, stating that he was motivated "out of a desire to protect our country" after '', July 23 2006 Soon after reporting to Fort Lewis, Watada discovered that his unit would be deploying to Iraq, in support of ongoing operations there. In preparation to deploy, he began conducting research on the country, its culture, and the reasons for the U.S. involvement in Iraq. After reading several books and articles about the history of Iraq, '', July 23 2006 Watada claims that he ceased to believe in the legality and morality of the war. In January 2006, he attempted to resign his commission. The Army denied his request because he had not fulfilled his eight year military service obligation for which he had contracted, as required by law. He used as justification for his request that the war violated the '', June 7 2006 Watada has said he is not a '', July 23 2006 CHARGES In response to Watada's refusal to deploy, the U.S. Army initially preferred seven specifications of various offenses under the UCMJ . Since the initial preferral, all but three specifications were dropped; the remaining ones sent to the court-martial follow:
When the initial charges were preferred, Watada faced the possibility of a General Court-Martial and up to seven years in prison as well as a dismissal (commissioned officers who are sentenced to punitive discharge by court-martial receive a dismissal, while personnel without a commission would receive a Dishonorable Discharge ) if convicted. About this eventuality, Watada said that he did not regret his decision and was willing to face the consequences, citing it as what he believed to be a moral responsibility:
On these charges, Watada's civilian attorney, Eric Seitz , comments:
ARTICLE 32 HEARING Watada's '', August 18 , 2006 The Army prosecutor, ", August 15 2005 Keith recommended Watada for court martial on all charges, even as he said that he thought that Watada was "sincere in his beliefs." Of the court-martial recommendation, Seitz accused the Army of trying Watada without looking seriously at his arguments and that of the other experts appearing at the trial about the legality of the war. [http://thankyoult.live.radicaldesigns.org/content/view/179/ Investigator recommends court marshal on all charges], '' Thankyoult.org '' POST-HEARING On '', September 18 2006 On the other hand, Eric Seitz asserts that the Army added the new charge to make a public example of him: "He's not doing anything other than saying things he believes to be true, and that we believe are true. This makes it that much clearer that this is just a political prosecution, and that's really all this case has been about from the beginning." COURT-MARTIAL On ,'' November 10 , 2006 |
|
|