April 2009 trial date set in Iraq gang rape

[unhappycamper]

April 2009 trial date set in Iraq gang rape
By Ryan Lenz - The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Dec 20, 2007 5:31:28 EST

They were convicted one after another — four U.S. soldiers who helped gang rape a 14-year-old Iraqi girl before a fifth among them allegedly killed her and her family in a drug-fueled daze.

In exchange for leniency, each struck deals to testify against the charismatic and troubled private who allegedly killed the family and planted in them the idea of raping the girl.

But the case against former Army Pvt. Steven D. Green has dragged slowly forward in the 18 months since the allegations surfaced. It’s a pace, military legal experts note, that bears stark contrast to swift prosecutions of nearly every other crime to come from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Defense attorneys and federal prosecutors have fought each other on the reach of federal courts into military affairs, the access civilian attorneys have to classified military evidence and, most recently, what constitutes enough time to prepare for trial.

Judge Thomas Russell only Tuesday set an April 13, 2009, date for trial, in an order entered in Paducah, Ky.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/12/ap_green_071219/