On Wednesday, the soldier who killed 16 Afghan villagers in 2012 reached a guilty plea deal to avoid the death penalty.
Sgt. Robert Bales is accused of premeditated murder for opening fire to a village in southern Kandahar in March 2012. Bales’ lawyer, John Henry Browne, says Bales was “crazed” and “broken.”
Bales had alcohol, Valium, and steroids in his system at the time. The defense argues he was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury after serving four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“He’s broken, and we [U.S. Army] broke him,” said Browne.
According to the Associated Press, the judge and the commanding general at Joint Base Lewis-McChord must approve the plea in June before the sentencing-phase trial in September.
Relatives of the victims will be outraged if Bales receives a life sentence rather than death penalty.
“A prison sentence doesn’t mean anything…if he doesn’t hang I will have my revenge” said Said Jan, whose wife and several relatives died in the attack.
A similar case occurred in 2009 according to Reuters, when Sergeant John Russell pleaded guilty to shooting five people at Camp Liberty combat stress clinic in Baghdad.
Photo courtesy of United States Army photography by Specialist Ryan Hallock