Marine From Troy Arrested,...

[SEATJERKER]

...I DO NOT KNOW HIM AS THE NAME RINGS A DISTANT BELL, BUT JUSTICE BECONS QUESTIONS TO BE ASKED...

...It seems that a Marine from my home City has been arrested in connection to a death of an Iraqi,...

...I would like to know of anyone knows of "any more" to this incident that can be brought to light,...

...by all means find the truth,...

...
Troy-- Reservist from Troy is working as lifeguard at base pool, according to his lawyer

By MICHELE MORGAN BOLTON, Staff writer
First published: Tuesday, October 21, 2003

A Marine combat machine-gunner from Troy charged with dereliction of duty and assault in the death of an Iraqi prison camp detainee has been reassigned as a lifeguard at the Camp Pendleton swimming pool.
Lance Cpl. William Scott Roy, 34, is one of eight Marine reservists facing charges in the incident in June at the Camp Whitehorse detention facility in Nasiriyah, Iraq.

A military court will convene in six weeks to hear their cases, in which the charges range from assault to maltreatment. Two face counts of negligent homicide in the beating death of Nagem Sadoon Hatab.

It is unclear why Hatab had been in U.S. custody, although Roy's lawyer, Donald Rehkopf Jr. of Rochester, said the man was not a prisoner of war and probably was not a member of the Iraqi army.

He said the reservists' job was especially difficult because Hatab had not been held with uniformed soldiers, but possibly with mercenaries or members of Saddam Hussein's Fedayeen militia.

"Most uniformed Iraqi soldiers who surrendered did so properly and behaved accordingly," Rehkopf said. "Those people weren't in this camp."

Roy, who has worked as a correction officer at the Rensselaer County jail for two years, is accused of grabbing Hatab "by the neck and face with his hands," on or about June 4, according to documents detailing the charges obtained by the Times Union.

The prisoner died the next day.

Roy also is accused of hitting and kicking other prisoners. He had been at Camp Whitehorse since April.

All eight Marines belong to the 2nd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment, based in Worcester, Mass. They were taken to Camp Pendleton because the unit running the Nasiriyah POW camp, the 1st Marine Division, is based there.

Roy was charged with one count of cruelty and maltreatment, two counts of dereliction of duty and five counts of assault in Uniform Code of Military Justice charges filed Thursday.

The 1988 Troy High School graduate joined the Marine Corps Reserve in November 2001.

His parents, Dorothy and Bill Roy of Niskayuna, said Monday they preferred not to comment. His wife, Michelle, and son, Cole, who live in Troy, could not be reached for comment.

Roy's attorney, Rehkopf, who is co-chairman of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers' Military Law Committee, said "Scott," as he is known, is doing as relatively well.

"From day one he has denied his guilt, and we are going to contest this case every which way possible," he said. "As far as I'm concerned, it's not an issue of the Marine Corps, per se, but why the Pentagon did not have the proper Army facilities in place to do the job that the Department of Defense says they should be doing."

None of the eight soldiers spoke Arabic, nor were they supplied an interpreter, he said. Nor has a copy of the autopsy report been made available.

"How can it come to be that this small group of Marine reservists got tagged with this very shady operation?" asked Rehkopf, an Air Force veteran who specializes in military cases.

He characterized Roy as a likable man of integrity and good character. So did his boss, Rensselaer County Sheriff Dan Keating, who said last weekend that Roy's work record was spotless.

When Roy and the others were told they were being investigated, they were ordered not to talk to lawyers, Rehkopf said: "He's a Marine ... and he does what he's told. But Scott said it didn't sound right."

Marine documents paint a different picture.

They say Roy should have known what his duties were and that he "willfully failed to properly safeguard the physical health, welfare and treatment of (Hatab), as was his duty to do."

The documents provide few details of Hatab's death. The San Diego Union-Tribune reported, however, that the case is strikingly similar to newspaper reports published in June regarding a 52-year-old Iraqi who was captured May 3 in Tallil.

The reports said the man was moved to a POW camp in Nasiriyah on June 3 and that he had been beaten on June 4 -- the same day that military documents say Hatab was beaten. On June 5, the prisoner reportedly complained of "health problems" and died the next day, the same day as Hatab.

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service launched a probe of the incident regarding the Iraqi. Newspaper reports stated that the criminal investigation was the first involving the death of a prisoner in U.S. custody in Iraq.

"There's an old, old saying that a leopard doesn't change his spots," Rehkopf said. "Scott's 34 years old. He's worked for a long time and been in the community for a long time. He wouldn't have been hired as a sheriff's deputy if there were a question about his integrity." Associated Press contributed to this report.

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