Tearful US soldier admits killing Iraqi

Tells court-martial sergeant ordered him to shoot man

US soldiers patrolled an area of Baghdad's Amil neighborhood yesterday that has been plagued by violence. (ALI AL-SAADI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

BAGHDAD - Army Sergeant Evan Vela held back tears as he told his court-martial yesterday that he had killed an Iraqi man who had stumbled into his sniper team's camp.

Vela told the court on the second day of his trial that his superior officer, Sergeant Michael Hensley, ordered him to shoot the Iraqi.

"I thought he was going to let him go," said Vela, who is charged with murder, planting a weapon, and making false statements. "I heard the word shoot. My next memory is the man was dead. It took me a minute for me to realize the shot came from the pistol in my hand. I don't remember pulling the trigger."

Vela's case is the last of three murder trials involving the sniper team. Hensley and Private Jorge Sandoval have been convicted on lesser charges.

The shootings have raised questions about the supervision of the snipers. On Friday, Hensley described planting weapons on bodies as an accepted tactic. Soldiers at pretrial hearings for Vela described seeking clearance for a baiting program, in which snipers would plant weapons and shoot Iraqis who picked them up, but it is unclear whether it was implemented.

Vela, whose lawyers portray him as a physically drained soldier battling post-traumatic stress disorder, has served as a gripping presence at the courts-martial. He broke down on the stand at Sandoval's trial, describing how Hensley had commanded him to shoot the Iraqi in the May 11 incident. But at Hensley's trial, Vela said he could not recall anything other than firing his pistol.

Yesterday, Vela described how he had been in a daze when the Iraqi entered the sniper team's camp. Vela said he thought the man was a danger but had no idea that Hensley planned to kill him.

Asked if he would have followed Hensley's orders to shoot if he had not been physically depleted and suffering from severe sleep deprivation, Vela bit his lip and answered: "I wouldn't have done it."

The defense called a forensic psychiatrist who testified that Vela had first showed signs of suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder last winter. In turn, prosecutors have sought to ridicule Vela's claim he didn't know what he was doing. A verdict in the trial is expected today.

The soldiers were assigned to the 25th Infantry Division at Fort Richardson, Alaska.

In a separate development yesterday, hundreds of US-backed Sunni tribesman shut their offices and rallied northeast of Baghdad, demanding the resignation of a provincial police chief they accuse of sectarian bias.

The demonstration in the city of Baqubah was organized by local Sunni fighters who left the insurgency to work with the Americans in ousting Al Qaeda and other militants from their hometowns.

The men, whose patrols are credited with tamping down violence in their neighborhoods, in recent months have grown frustrated with the province's Shi'ite-dominated government.

Some have been denied jobs in the Iraqi security forces, and they accuse General Ghanim al-Qureyshi, the Shi'ite director general of police in Diyala Province, of trying to maintain a Shi'ite majority in the department.

"Al-Qureyshi targets Sunnis and kidnaps women," a banner hoisted above the crowd read.

A spokesman for Qureyshi said the police chief did not want to comment on the protests.

The Sunni fighters' threats to end their cooperation underscores the challenges US forces face in managing the relationship with the new allies, who have been credited with helping to uproot Al Qaeda in Iraq from strongholds first in Anbar Province, west of the capital, and then in difficult districts in Baghdad and satellite cities to the north and south.

Elsewhere in the country, Iraqi police arrested 31 Shi'ite activists in raids south of Baghdad on the third day of US-Iraqi operations in an area that includes several Shi'ite holy cities.

The raids have raised tension with some Shi'ite tribesmen and fighters who have pledged to halt attacks on US and Iraqi forces. Radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr ordered a six-month cease-fire for his Mahdi Army militia, but some members have broken away and violated the pledge, which expires later this month.

Fifteen of yesterday's arrests were in Karbala, a Shi'ite holy city 50 miles south of Baghdad. Sixteen others were arrested in a Sadrist area in Nasiriyah, about 200 miles southeast of the capital, police said.

Rahman Mshawi, spokesman for Karbala police, said four of the Karbala suspects are members of the Iraq-based People's Mujahedeen Organization of Iran, or Mujahedeen Khalq.

The group was founded in the late 1960s and fled to Iraq in the early 1980s after it fell out with the clerical regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. During Saddam Hussein's rule, the movement used Iraq as a base for operations against Iran's government.

Material from the Associated Press was included in this report.