PADUCAH, Ky. – A Kentucky jury is deciding whether a former soldier convicted of raping and murdering an Iraqi teen and killing her family should be sentenced to die or imprisoned for life.
Jurors started deliberations Wednesday afternoon in the case of former Pfc. Steven Dale Green.
The jury convicted the 24-year-old from Midland, Texas, on May 7 of raping and killing 14-year-old Abeer Qassim al-Janabi and shooting her family to death in March 2006 while he was serving in Iraq.
During closing arguments Wednesday, federal prosecutors said Green should be sentenced to death because of the brutality of the crime.
His attorneys asked jurors to spare him. Civilians are deciding the case because he wasn't charged until he'd left the military.
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