Former U.S. Marine Testifies To Atrocities In Iraq and requests Asylum in Canada

Ed Corrigan

Washington Post
December 8, 2004
Pg. 20

Former Marine Testifies To Atrocities In Iraq

Unit Killed Dozens of Unarmed Civilians Last Year,
Canadian Refugee Board Is Told

By Doug Struck, Washington Post Foreign Service

TORONTO, Dec. 7 -- A former U.S. Marine staff sergeant
testified at a hearing Tuesday that his unit killed at
least 30 unarmed civilians in Iraq during the war in
2003 and that Marines routinely shot and killed
wounded Iraqis.

Jimmy J. Massey, a 12-year veteran, said he left Iraq
in May 2003 after a diagnosis of post-traumatic
stress. He said he and his men shot and killed four
Iraqis staging a demonstration and a man with his
hands up trying to surrender, as well as women and
children at roadblocks. Massey said he had complained
to his superiors about the "killing of innocent
civilians," but that nothing was done.

Massey, 33, of Waynesville, N.C., was the chief
witness at a refugee board hearing for a U.S. Army
deserter, Jeremy Hinzman, who is attempting to win
asylum in Canada after he fled from Fort Bragg, N.C.,
rather than go to Iraq. Hinzman, 25, the first of at
least three U.S. military deserters to apply for
asylum here, argues that he refused to go to Iraq to
avoid committing war crimes.

In Washington, a Marine Corps spokesman at the
Pentagon said Massey's charges had been investigated
and were unproved.

"We take such allegations very seriously," said Maj.
Douglas Powell. "And Jimmy Massey, who is a former
staff sergeant, out of the Corps, has made these
statements before in the press. They've been looked
into, and nothing has been substantiated."

Massey is a former Marine recruiter who served in Iraq
as the staff sergeant for a platoon that ranged from
25 to 50 men. He testified that the killings occurred
in late March or early April 2003 as his unit, the
weapons company of the 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine
Regiment, moved northward to Baghdad and then beyond.

During one 48-hour period, Massey said under oath, his
platoon set up roadblocks and killed "30-plus"
civilians. He said his men, fearing suicide bombers,
poured massive firepower into cars that did not stop
as they approached the roadblocks. In each instance,
he said, none of the cars was found to have contained
explosives or arms.

"Why didn't the Iraqis stop? That is something that
has plagued me every waking moment of the day," he
said. He said they may have been confused by the
Americans' gestures or thought that a warning shot was
celebratory gunfire.

"I don't know if the Iraqi people thought we were
celebrating their newfound freedom. But I do know we
killed innocent civilians," Massey said. In one case,
the driver of a car leaped out with his hands up. "But
we kept firing. We killed him," Massey said. In
another case, he and other Marines shot and killed
four protesters near a checkpoint after a single
incoming gunshot from an unknown source, he said. None
of the protesters was found with arms.

The testimony of Massey, who was honorably discharged
six months after his medical evacuation from Iraq, is
the main surviving thrust of the strategy by Hinzman's
attorney to put the Iraq war on trial at the refugee
hearing. The asylum bids by Hinzman and two other
servicemen are a dilemma for the Canadian government,
which is seeking to repair relations with the Bush
administration. Canada refused to join the U.S.
invasion of Iraq, and the war remains highly unpopular
in Canada.

The government won a ruling that the legality of the
Iraq war could not be an issue at the refugee hearing.
But Hinzman's attorney, Jeffry House, has introduced
testimonials and human rights reports to support
Hinzman's claim that he would have been forced to
violate the Geneva Conventions in Iraq.

Some of Hinzman's supporters, including House, are
Vietnam-era draft dodgers. They compare Massey's
testimony to the disclosure of the My Lai massacre of
civilians in Vietnam.

Hinzman, who served a tour in Afghanistan with the
82nd Airborne Division, had applied for a transfer to
a noncombat position in the Army. When that was
rejected and his division was ordered to Iraq, Hinzman
drove from Fort Bragg to Canada in January with his
wife and infant son.

The family is living in a basement apartment in
Toronto while their request is heard. If it is
rejected, Hinzman has said, they expect to file
appeals in the Canadian courts.

Staff writer Christopher Lee in Washington contributed
to this report.