Contractors' Attorney: Blackwater Is Scapegoating My Clients In Kabul Murder Case

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Contractors' Attorney: Blackwater Is Scapegoating My Clients In Kabul Murder Case
Justin Elliott | January 14, 2010, 8:45AM

A lawyer for the Blackwater contractors charged last week with killing two men in Kabul says his clients were thrown under the bus by a company desperate to preserve its standing with the Afghan government, after another shooting case in Iraq led to a crackdown on its operations in that country.

Directly after the Kabul shooting last May, Blackwater went into crisis mode, Attorney Daniel Callahan tells TPMmuckraker. That same month, the company fired the two contractors who were charged last week, as well as two others who were involved in the incident, for violating the company's drinking policy.

Callahan says Blackwater fabricated the drinking charge and was worried because the men had been given guns even though they weren't authorized to carry weapons off base. The shooting occurred after a disputed traffic accident in Kabul.

Callahan says Blackwater portrayed the men as "on a lark" to dissociate itself with episode. "The company didn't want to get kicked out of Afghanistan," he says.

A federal prosecutor repeated the drinking charge in arguing against bond for one of the contractors in court in Virgina Tuesday.

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