http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0316/p99s01-duts.htmlBritish verdict: 'friendly fire' death of soldier in Iraq 'criminal'
Inquest coroner criticizes US officials for failing to help investigation of attack by US pilots.
By Tom Regan | csmonitor.com
A British corner has ruled that the "friendly fire" death of a British soldier in Iraq, in 2003, was an unlawful and criminal act. The Daily Telegraph reports that Andrew Walker, the Oxfordshire assistant deputy coroner, said he did not think the attack that killed Corporal Matty Hall was an "honest mistake" as there was no evidence that the US pilots involved were "acting in self defense." Mr. Walker also criticized American officials for refusing to cooperate with his inquiry.
The inquest, at Oxford's Old Assizes, had heard how the pilot of a US A-10 Tank-buster plane swooped and opened fire on the L/Cpl Hull's armed vehicle convoy in southern Iraq on March 28, 2003.
L/Cpl Hull died in the attack, which happened just three days before his 26th birthday. Four other British soldiers were injured. The British vehicles were clearly marked. But they were targeted by two US jets who were patrolling the area in search of Iraqi forces.
US and British officials had tried to suppress all evidence concerning the incident, but a transcript of the conversation between the two parttime reservist US pilots involved and ground control was published in the Sun newspaper in January. The transcript indicates that the pilots knew they had done something wrong, including one of the pilots saying after the attack "We're in jail, dude."
The Guardian reports the US military had refused to make the two pilots involved available to the inquest. After the verdict was read, widow Susan Hall expressed her disappointment with President Bush, whom she had met in 2003, and who had promised to help her get to the bottom of what happened to her husband.
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