World News Daily reports that LTC Lakin is scheduled to make another (potentially another) potential public confession:
A U.S. Army officer challenging President Obama to document his eligibility to occupy to Oval Office will be telling his story to Anderson Cooper on his 360 program on CNN.
The interview is scheduled to be broadcast from CNN’s New York studios at 10 p.m. Eastern. Lakin will appear with his attorney, Paul Rolf Jensen.
Marine Corps Times reports:
Moved by a huge tide of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress, Congress has pressured the Department of Veterans Affairs to settle their disability claims — quickly, humanely and mostly in the vets’ favor.
This 1969 photo shows Keith Roberts in Navy uniform. Starting in 1987, Roberts filed a string of disability claims with the Veterans Affairs, eventually blaming PTSD for everything from smoking addiction to arthritis. In 1999, Roberts was declared 100 percent disabled and got a lump sum payment, retroactive to August 1993. He was convicted of wire fraud, sentenced to 48 months in prison and ordered to pay $262,943.52 in restitution.
Marine Corps TimesThe problem: The system is dysfunctional, an open invitation to fraud. And the VA has proposed changes that could make deception even easier.
PTSD’s real but invisible scars can mark clerks and cooks just as easily as they can infantrymen fighting a faceless enemy in these wars without front lines. The VA is seeking to ease the burden of proof to ensure that their claims are processed swiftly.
KXXV.com reports:
A Fort Hood soldier accused of possession of child pornography has been sentenced.
A General Court-Martial found Sgt. Donald Keith Whitten guilty of wrongful possession of child pornography earlier this week.
On habeas review of state court convictions, the detective’s trial testimony about the statements of two non-testifying co-actors which implicated the defendant in the shooting and which were used to confront the defendant during his interview violated the Confrontation Clause and constituted plain error, in Ray v. Boatwright, _ F.3d _ (No. 08-2825).
I posted yesterday a couple of items where Mr. Galligan indicates he’s been given notice that the prosecution intends seeking the death penalty in the Hasan case. He’s wrong, but not wrong. It’s a question of terminology and reality.
Here is a quick note from KWTX.com:
FORT HOOD (April 30, 2010)–Fort Hood authorities said Friday they have not reached a decision to seek the death penalty in the upcoming Article 32 for Army Maj. Nidal M. Hasan.
Here are some links to reports that the prosecution will seek to provide death penalty related information to the Article 32, UCMJ, IO.
AP:
Stars & Stripes:
http://goo.gl/NOZB
United States v. Holmes.
On direct appeal the NMCCA set aside the original findings of guilty to negligent homicide and the sentence.
A rehearing on sentence was authorized for the remaining guilty finding of false official statement.
An accused has a limited right to counsel in the military. A very common event for defense counsel is PCS, release from active duty, and orders to deployment. Marine Corps Times reports:
A military appeals court has thrown out the 2007 conviction of a Marine infantry squad leader accused of murdering an innocent man in the Iraqi town of Hamdaniya.
Pvt. Lawrence G. Hutchins III, a former sergeant now serving an 11-year sentence in the military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., will be released from confinement if the Navy does not appeal the court’s Thursday ruling, his attorney, Capt. Babu Kaza, told Marine Corps Times. However, Hutchins also could face a new set of charges if the Marine Corps wants to readdress his case.
Main Justice reports:
A high-profile appeal of an Army First Lieutenant convicted last year of killing an unarmed detainee in Iraq could turn in part on whether military prosecutors withheld exculpatory evidence.
[The] case underscores how the government is being forced to explain, in the military courts as well as the civilian justice system, its compliance with Brady v. Maryland, the 1963 Supreme Court case that requires prosecutors to turn over exculpatory information to the defense.
Court-Martial Trial Practice Blog
