U.S. Master Sergeant John Hatley murdered four Iraqi prisoners execution style, a military court ruled Wednesday. The eight-member panel said that after a 2007 firefight with a set of Iraqi insurgents, Hatley acted as “judge, jury and executioner” when he blindfolded the prisoners, shot them one after the other, and dumped their bodies in a nearby canal. Two soldiers in Hatley’s unit were convicted in connection to the killings earlier this year and two pleaded guilty and were sentenced to jail last year. If convicted on all counts of premeditated murder and conspiracy to commit premeditated murder, Hatley could face life in prison. (AP)
New Jersey police may be misusing immigration inquiry rules by using racial profiling to pull over Latino drivers, passengers, and crime victims, according to a study by Seton Hall Law School. The study cites 69 cases over the past nine months in which people being questioned by police were asked about their immigration status for no apparent reason besides their appearance. In some cases, suspects were arrested after they were unable to produce evidence that they were legal U.S. residents, and later passed on to Immigration and Customs Enforcement after being held for weeks or months. (New York Times)
A report by USAID accuses the United Nations of misusing more than $25 million in U.S. funds for “quick impact” infrastructure projects during a period of four years, according to a report by the USAID inspector general. The report found that with U.S. money, the U.N. performed low-quality work, squandered funds on superfluous projects – including $200,000 to renovate a U.N. official’s guesthouse – and left many projects unfinished. A spokesperson for U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice said that “this is a disturbing report and an egregious example of the kind of fraud and waste that needs to be fixed.” (USA Today)
An F.B.I interpreter claims that she heard a terror suspect being beaten while interpreting his questioning. Mohamed Rashed Daoud al-‘Owhali was sentenced to prison in 2001 for helping plan an attack on an American embassy, which killed more than 200 people. While interpreting a 1998 interrogation into al-‘Owhali, the former FBI interpreter reports hearing sounds of beating and pleas for help, including “Sister, please make them stop beating me.” Al-‘Owhali’s lawyer says that while the beatings were not technically torture, the discrepancy is “a distinction without a difference.” (New York Times)
In an effort to distance itself from what some military officers consider propaganda, senior officials said Wednesday that the Pentagon has closed the Defense Department for support to public diplomacy. The office was created in 2007 as a center to coordinate the Pentagon’s message with other government agencies, including the White House and various American embassies. When the office began distributing “talking points” for officials to use while responding to issues like civilian casualties, some worried that Afghan citizens would view the information as blatant propaganda. A senior Pentagon official told the New York Times, “because of the history of the office, we needed a fresh start in how we integrate the critical function of strategic communications across the board.” (New York Times)
The court-appointed lawyer overseeing Allen Stanford’s company sued to recover $40 million that Stanford advisors earned while promoting the sale of the company’s certificates of deposit, which are believed to be at the heart of Stanford’s alleged $8 billion Ponzi scheme. The lawsuit, filed by receiver Ralph Janvey, says that the funds paid to 66 Stanford employees were not generated from legitimate business transactions, “but from monies contributed by defrauded investors.” (Reuters)
