Two More Americans Charged for Prison Abuse
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
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BAGHDAD, Iraq — Two more American soldiers have been ordered to stand trial in the Abu Ghraib (search) prisoner abuse scandal although no date for the courts-martial was set, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt (search) announced Wednesday.
Sgt. Javal Davis, 26, of Maryland and Staff Sgt. Ivan L. "Chip" Frederick II of Buckingham, Va., were ordered to undergo a general court-martial, Kimmitt said. He said the trial date and venue had not been set.
Spc. Jeremy C. Sivits, of Hyndman, Pa., goes on trial May 19 before a special court-martial, which cannot levy as severe a sentence as a general court-martial.
Davis has been charged with conspiracy to maltreat detainees, dereliction of duty for failing to protect detainees from abuse, maltreatment of detainees, rendering false official statements and assault.
Frederick has been charged with conspiracy to maltreat detainees, dereliction of duty for negligibly failing to protect detainees from abuse, maltreatment of detainees, and wrongfully committing an indecent act by watching detainees commit a sexual act.
Both Davis and Frederick are assigned to the 372nd Military Police Company (search).
An Army report quoted testimony from a witness who said he saw Davis hit prisoners in a pile. According to the same report, he told Army investigators he was "made to do various things that I would question morally."
He also told investigators that military intelligence personnel appeared to approve of the abuse. "We were told they had different rules," he told investigators, according to the report.
Before deployment in February 2003, Frederick, 37, was a corrections officer at Buckingham Correctional Center, a state prison in rural Dillwyn, in south-central Virginia. His wife, Martha, also works there.
The Army report quotes testimony from a witness who said he saw Frederick hit prisoners stacked in a pile and hit a prisoner who posed no threat. The witness also reportedly testified he observed Frederick watching two inmates perform a sexual act.
In Frederick's written accounts of conditions at Abu Ghraib that he sent to his family, he said his job was to prepare prisoners for interrogation and that he was told, "This is how military intelligence wants it done." He said military intelligence officers "encouraged us and told us, 'Great job."'
Frederick wrote that when he questioned the acting battalion commander about harsh inmate conditions, he was told "to do as he says."
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