Posted on Oct 30, 2015
Military court upholds death sentence in 2003 ‘fragging’ case
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From Stars & Stripes:
WASHINGTON — The nation’s highest military court has affirmed the conviction and death sentence for Hasan K. Akbar, who admitted killing two fellow U.S. soldiers at the start of the Iraq War.
In a closely split decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces rejected claims by Akbar that his original defense team was ineffective. Akbar argued at trial that he was mentally ill when he killed two and wounded 14 in the March 2003 attack in Kuwait.
“We conclude that if there ever was a case where a military court-martial panel would impose the death penalty, this was it,” Judge Kevin A. Ohlson wrote.
The court’s 3-2 decision leaves Akbar one of six military men to be facing execution at the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks in Leavenworth, Kan. Though he had launched a wide-ranging challenge to his conviction and sentence, a big part of the case decided Wednesday dealt with his claim of ineffective counsel.
“With the benefit of appellate hindsight, we could dissect every move of these trial defense counsel and then impose our own views on how they could have handled certain matters differently and, perhaps, better,” Ohlson noted. “However, that is not the standard of review we are obligated to apply.”
Ohlson, a former Army paratrooper and federal prosecutor appointed to the court by President Barack Obama, observed that Akbar was “represented by two experienced military attorneys who devoted more than two years to preparing and presenting the defense in this case.”
The two dissenting judges countered that Akbar’s trial defense attorneys fell short, with specific mistakes that included providing Akbar’s 313-page diary to the court-martial panel.
“These pages included a running diatribe against Caucasians and the United States dating back 12 years, and included repeated references to (his) desire to kill American soldiers ‘for Allah’ and for ‘jihad,' ” Judge James E. Baker noted.
Baker, who has since retired, explained that “the defense intended the diary to reflect (Akbar’s) descent into mental illness,” but that it was “offered without adequate explanation, expert or otherwise.”
More broadly, Baker observed that the defense team had a hard time in making the case for Akbar because “the armed forces have no guidelines regarding the qualifications, training, or performance required of capital defense counsel.”
Born Mark Fidel Kools, the son of a felon and the product of broken home, Akbar was from a young age “indoctrinated in the Nation of Islam’s militant teachings,” defense attorneys recounted in a brief.
Nonetheless a top student in high school, Akbar graduated in 1997 from the University of California, Davis with dual degrees in aeronautical and mechanical engineering. Akbar took nine years to complete college, subsequently enlisting in the Army in 1998.
He was a sergeant assigned to the 326th Engineer Battalion, 101st Airborne Division when his unit deployed to Kuwait. Early on the morning of March 23, 2003, as the U.S. invasion of Iraq was unfolding, Akbar threw incendiary and fragmentation grenades and fired his M-4 rifle in his solo assault on officers sleeping in several tents.
Army Capt. Christopher S. Seifert, a Pennsylvania native and intelligence officer, and Air Force Maj. Gregory L. Stone, a Boise, Idaho, resident and member of the Idaho Air National Guard, died in the attack.
Stone, the appeals court noted, “was killed from 83 shrapnel wounds.”
The Army’s subsequent investigation found evidence that Akbar had previously contemplated attacking his fellow soldiers.
“As soon as I am in Iraq, I am going to try and kill as many of them as possible,” Akbar wrote in a Feb. 4, 2003, diary entry, made public at his court-martial held at Fort Bragg, N.C.
The court-martial panel required only 2 1/2 hours to convict Akbar, a decision later upheld by the U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals. Akbar’s attorneys subsequently challenged the conviction and death sentence in a massive 328-page brief submitted to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, a panel of civilians based in Washington.
“Against all odds,” Army Capt. Aaron R. Inkenbrandt and Akbar’s other appellate attorneys wrote, “Akbar seemed fated for success, until mental illness weakened the resolve that for so long repressed years of deprivation.”
———
©2015 McClatchy Washington Bureau
Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau at http://www.mcclatchydc.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
http://www.stripes.com/military-court-upholds-death-sentence-in-2003-fragging-case-1.363962
WASHINGTON — The nation’s highest military court has affirmed the conviction and death sentence for Hasan K. Akbar, who admitted killing two fellow U.S. soldiers at the start of the Iraq War.
In a closely split decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces rejected claims by Akbar that his original defense team was ineffective. Akbar argued at trial that he was mentally ill when he killed two and wounded 14 in the March 2003 attack in Kuwait.
“We conclude that if there ever was a case where a military court-martial panel would impose the death penalty, this was it,” Judge Kevin A. Ohlson wrote.
The court’s 3-2 decision leaves Akbar one of six military men to be facing execution at the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks in Leavenworth, Kan. Though he had launched a wide-ranging challenge to his conviction and sentence, a big part of the case decided Wednesday dealt with his claim of ineffective counsel.
“With the benefit of appellate hindsight, we could dissect every move of these trial defense counsel and then impose our own views on how they could have handled certain matters differently and, perhaps, better,” Ohlson noted. “However, that is not the standard of review we are obligated to apply.”
Ohlson, a former Army paratrooper and federal prosecutor appointed to the court by President Barack Obama, observed that Akbar was “represented by two experienced military attorneys who devoted more than two years to preparing and presenting the defense in this case.”
The two dissenting judges countered that Akbar’s trial defense attorneys fell short, with specific mistakes that included providing Akbar’s 313-page diary to the court-martial panel.
“These pages included a running diatribe against Caucasians and the United States dating back 12 years, and included repeated references to (his) desire to kill American soldiers ‘for Allah’ and for ‘jihad,' ” Judge James E. Baker noted.
Baker, who has since retired, explained that “the defense intended the diary to reflect (Akbar’s) descent into mental illness,” but that it was “offered without adequate explanation, expert or otherwise.”
More broadly, Baker observed that the defense team had a hard time in making the case for Akbar because “the armed forces have no guidelines regarding the qualifications, training, or performance required of capital defense counsel.”
Born Mark Fidel Kools, the son of a felon and the product of broken home, Akbar was from a young age “indoctrinated in the Nation of Islam’s militant teachings,” defense attorneys recounted in a brief.
Nonetheless a top student in high school, Akbar graduated in 1997 from the University of California, Davis with dual degrees in aeronautical and mechanical engineering. Akbar took nine years to complete college, subsequently enlisting in the Army in 1998.
He was a sergeant assigned to the 326th Engineer Battalion, 101st Airborne Division when his unit deployed to Kuwait. Early on the morning of March 23, 2003, as the U.S. invasion of Iraq was unfolding, Akbar threw incendiary and fragmentation grenades and fired his M-4 rifle in his solo assault on officers sleeping in several tents.
Army Capt. Christopher S. Seifert, a Pennsylvania native and intelligence officer, and Air Force Maj. Gregory L. Stone, a Boise, Idaho, resident and member of the Idaho Air National Guard, died in the attack.
Stone, the appeals court noted, “was killed from 83 shrapnel wounds.”
The Army’s subsequent investigation found evidence that Akbar had previously contemplated attacking his fellow soldiers.
“As soon as I am in Iraq, I am going to try and kill as many of them as possible,” Akbar wrote in a Feb. 4, 2003, diary entry, made public at his court-martial held at Fort Bragg, N.C.
The court-martial panel required only 2 1/2 hours to convict Akbar, a decision later upheld by the U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals. Akbar’s attorneys subsequently challenged the conviction and death sentence in a massive 328-page brief submitted to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, a panel of civilians based in Washington.
“Against all odds,” Army Capt. Aaron R. Inkenbrandt and Akbar’s other appellate attorneys wrote, “Akbar seemed fated for success, until mental illness weakened the resolve that for so long repressed years of deprivation.”
———
©2015 McClatchy Washington Bureau
Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau at http://www.mcclatchydc.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
http://www.stripes.com/military-court-upholds-death-sentence-in-2003-fragging-case-1.363962
Death Penalty
Court Martial
Justice
Posted 10 y ago
Responses: 119
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Excellent read on this is "Embedded Enemy" written by Command SGT Major Bart E. Womack (Ret).
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Okay, the system has run its course. His conviction has been upheld as has his sentence. Now????
I will bet a dollar against a donut hole that this murderer dies of old age at the USDB.
I will bet a dollar against a donut hole that this murderer dies of old age at the USDB.
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SSG Michael Fraer
He most likely will die of old age at the USDB. The last time a military prisoner was executed was in 1961.
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PVT David Seguin
i am mocking the people that say islam is the religion of peace. in other words, i do not believe what people say about islam being peaceful, not with the verses of abrigation and the verse 9:29 that says to fight unbelievers wherever you find them until they pay the jezya and feel themselves subdued...
i do hope you are not trying to bait me into some debate about islam, as honestly i do hope i have fully explained myself with two verses straight from the horses mouth stating that islam is evil and anyone practicing islam should be on a permanent watch list because if anyone pays close enough attention to what islam teaches, they will see that all of the peaceful verses that are apart of islam are destroyed with just this one last verse of the same quran that all moslems read, not just the moslems that feel they are peaceful and denounce large parts of islam, but the true moslems that totally embrace islam and all of the quran, you know, isis?
i do hope you are not trying to bait me into some debate about islam, as honestly i do hope i have fully explained myself with two verses straight from the horses mouth stating that islam is evil and anyone practicing islam should be on a permanent watch list because if anyone pays close enough attention to what islam teaches, they will see that all of the peaceful verses that are apart of islam are destroyed with just this one last verse of the same quran that all moslems read, not just the moslems that feel they are peaceful and denounce large parts of islam, but the true moslems that totally embrace islam and all of the quran, you know, isis?
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SSgt William Richardson
Christianity is supposedly a religion of peace, but look at the bloodbath in almost the entire Old Testament. I respect your right to your argument, but I really don't buy it, and I don't think that other people should either.
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PVT David Seguin
SSgt William Richardson - well, that's your "opinion" and we all know what they say about opinions.
on the factual basis, you obvioiusly have no idea about christianity other than the fact we have a book called the holy bible and may have even heard a few stories from it, in fact you might have even read a couple of them, this is pretty much the same thinking moohamhead had when he made up islam.
this isn't a grandstand for debating christianity, so i will just tell you plain and simple you need to go google your facts and not listen to opinions, because christianity is based on the teachings of jesus christ, who by the way does not at all condone violence or teach violence in the new testament which is what christianity is based off of. if you are following the whole old testament thing, that means you are an anti-semite, which is someone who doesn't like judaism, because the old testament is basically judaism.
back to the subject matter at hand about this whole "fragging" incident with this islamic person that decided to kill his own people...
seriously, this is the kind of work that moohamhead the pig raping pedophile taught his followers to do, and we are about to bring a bunch of these people into the united states, look at what they just did in france.
come on.. really? are you this blind?
on the factual basis, you obvioiusly have no idea about christianity other than the fact we have a book called the holy bible and may have even heard a few stories from it, in fact you might have even read a couple of them, this is pretty much the same thinking moohamhead had when he made up islam.
this isn't a grandstand for debating christianity, so i will just tell you plain and simple you need to go google your facts and not listen to opinions, because christianity is based on the teachings of jesus christ, who by the way does not at all condone violence or teach violence in the new testament which is what christianity is based off of. if you are following the whole old testament thing, that means you are an anti-semite, which is someone who doesn't like judaism, because the old testament is basically judaism.
back to the subject matter at hand about this whole "fragging" incident with this islamic person that decided to kill his own people...
seriously, this is the kind of work that moohamhead the pig raping pedophile taught his followers to do, and we are about to bring a bunch of these people into the united states, look at what they just did in france.
come on.. really? are you this blind?
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It's really sad that it took this long to convict someone that obviously committed the crime and didn't contest the fact that he did.
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SSG Michael Fraer
He was initially convicted and sentenced in 2005. His conviction was upheld by the Army Court of Criminal Appeals in 2012. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces affirmed the conviction and sentence. I believe his final appeal would be to the US Supreme Court.
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Sgt Tom Vaughn
There is nothing inappropriate in what I said , now if I said. " send him to see Buddha ". That might be , but then again I might be a buddist. !
I stand by what I said. , but if it helps SSG Davis feel better ,
Now get a rope and send that cowardly killer to see and feel the wrath of God !
I stand by what I said. , but if it helps SSG Davis feel better ,
Now get a rope and send that cowardly killer to see and feel the wrath of God !
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PO3 Chris Scheide
I see it as an appropriate comment since he did write that he wanted to kill whites for allah. It is common knowledge that jihadi's believe that they get to meet allah when they die.
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We've already spent too much time and money on this guy. Time to show him the door.
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PO1 John Miller
1SG Gregory Griffin
More like show him his coffin and maybe make him dig his own grave!
More like show him his coffin and maybe make him dig his own grave!
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Tie this piece of shit to Nidal Malik Hasan and throw both out of a C-130 over the middle of the ocean. That way, their bodies would never pollute our country's soil.
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As a United States Marine I've read all of your comments about putting this person down and I must say... I agree ! Semper Fi
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