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Jury: Ex-Blackwater contractors guilty in 'outrageous' Nusoor Square shooting

"We gots enough black men's in prison already" Sound familiar?

Where did the quote come from? When I google it, I come up with debatepolitics.:lamo

So you found absolutely no issue with the evidence. No issue with the police work? No issue with Furhmann?
 
At least, when Americans murder women and children, there is an American judicial system that will make them pay for their heinous crimes. Let the title of "baby killers" rest with ISIS, who truly deserve the name. Americans hold themselves to a higher standard, and woe to those who violate it. Excellent verdict. :)

Article is here.

IMO they should have been left in that country to face punishment. Not brought here and prosecuted.
 
IMO they should have been left in that country to face punishment. Not brought here and prosecuted.

That would have violated their civil rights.
 
I, too, believe that America and Americans are far better than this. I don't know the details, and certainly Baghdad during time of war and its aftermath is likely no picnic, but the killing of so many people in a public square cannot go unpunished.

Perhaps if this verdict had been more timely the government of Iraq would have been more receptive to American forces remaining in Iraq in 2010/2011 and not subject to Iraqi law and courts. If they'd seen that Americans can be trusted to fully prosecute the wrongdoing of their agents they would have agreed to the terms and the issues in Iraq with ISIS/ISIL/IS would not have reached this stage.

We would have never prosecuted someone for violating Sharia Law.
 
That would have violated their civil rights.

They have the same rights in that country as everyone else in that country. Just because you're a US citizen does not mean that you have the same rights as a US citizen in anyone else's country. You obey the law of the land in the country that you are in and suffer the consequences of that country if you don't.

Lets put it this way. If a country that someone else was a citizen of allowed "honor killings" should that person be allowed to do the same thing on US soil? Hell no. And I know you wouldn't agree to that either. You'd tell that other country where to stick their laws and demand that person be tried on US soil under US laws. And you'd be right to. What happened with these people is no different.
 
So in a way it's our fault huh

Your posts constantly display a kind of dismissive victimhood that is unbecoming the strong nation America is. If people don't trust you - your nation, or you personally - then yes, it's your own fault that you've given people reason not to trust you or not done enough to gain their trust. Is it always right or fair - no - but it is what it is.
 
IMO, even as the details of the above two cases differ, the principles that define whether a claim of self-defense is justified are shared. Hence, it is no surprise that both cases resulted in the failure of the self-defense argument.
:doh
You don't even know why the Juries found the way they did. Yet here you are making it up. Truly sad.


The Wafer case in Michigan saw the argument of self-defense fail, because the shooter fired through a locked screen door at a woman. There was no imminent threat to the shooter's life. He could have easily closed and locked the door he had opened prior to shooting the woman and called the police.
Either of his accounts of purposely pulling the trigger or accidentally pulling the trigger after being startled by the person who was violently pounding to get into his home, are alone reasonable. Unfortunately he changed his story and the Jury didn't believe him because of it.

To the underlined.
What you state is nonsense. Had he been found guilty over such reasoning, it would have been a miscarriage of justice.
The law does not require that you do something else or call the police, it requires the actions of using the firearm in self defense at that moment to be reasonable.
But as we know, it wasn't for that, it was that the JUry didn't believe him because he changed his story.


The Dunn case also saw the argument of self-defense fail. In this case, the targets of the shooting were unarmed. Moreover, they were trying to drive away from the scene of the argument, in effect "disengaging" from the confrontation. Even if a threat had existed, and no witnesses saw the victims of the shooting ever draw a shotgun and the teens were found to have been unarmed, disengagement would indicate that the threat had ended. Therefore, the kind of imminent threat required to sustain a self-defense argument was lacking. That the shooter failed to contact the police afterward further undercut the self-defense argument, as reasonable people who had defended themselves would have contacted the police to report their actions confident that they had acted lawfully.
Still showing you do not know the evidence of the case and willing to spin what do, all the while substituting your judgement for what is reasonable.
:doh

The lack of a weapon is easily attributable to their suspicious activity, and return from, the other parking lot, as well as the Police failing to search that area. Which the young men suspiciously failed to tell the police about.

The Durango backed up and stopped behind him (you know, within feet of him), which he then continued shooting. That is not disengagement.
(A vehicle with the armed threat is still a threat, and would remain a threat until it was far enough away, especially as no one could see in the vehicle with it's tinted windows.)
The Durango again started moving and only after it was no longer a threat did he stop shooting.

And given the trauma he just experienced, Dunn's actions after the shooting are what a normal person may do. Reasonable folks understand that.





Let's see if I can respond to this as some of our more addled...oops..I mean illustrious posters might....
The arguments made were/are about the evidence. You can't even refute the arguments made, and instead want to make completely untrue assertions. That is a demonstration of addled reasoning. :lamo
 
:doh
You don't even know why the Juries found the way they did. Yet here you are making it up. Truly sad.

Sorry, I believe it's the other way around. Otherwise, there would have been no bewilderment about the two juries' verdicts in the Dunn case, both of which rejected the shooter's self-defense alibi. Your opinion is noted. IMO, it is wrong. More consequential, the juries that had all the evidence and reviewed it in its proper context also concluded that Dunn had not acted in self-defense. One jury even found premeditation since he reached into his glove compartment to pull out his murder weapon at the time when the teens were trying to drive away.

Given what was reported, I also believe Dunn made an "untrue assertion" of self-defense. Dunn did not act in self-defense.

Firing "again and again" as he described it suggests more than an attempt to neutralize a "threat" that quite frankly never existed. Attacking the Durango when the teens were leaving the scene also undercuts any notion of self-defense. As The New York Times reported:

In the end, the jury found that Mr. Dunn intended to kill Mr. Davis and acted with premeditation as he reached into his glove compartment for his gun and fired 10 times at Mr. Davis and the Durango, even as it pulled away to evade the gunfire. Three bullets hit Mr. Davis...

Mr. Dunn fled the scene and never called the police, not even after he learned that someone had died. Instead, he and the woman who was then his fiancée drove to their hotel, where he walked the dog, poured himself a rum and Coke and ordered a pizza. The next day he drove two and a half hours back to his house in Satellite Beach, where the police, who by then had his license plate number, arrested him.


http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/02/u...florida-youth-in-loud-music-dispute.html?_r=0

Never reporting the shooting demonstrates that Dunn didn't want the police to learn about his actions (why not?). Never mentioning anything about a gun to his fiance indicated that there was no "shotgun." Both his failure to report his shooting to the police and his lack of mention of the alleged shotgun to his fiance (now ex-fiance) strongly indicated that he concocted a self-defense argument and fabricated the account of his seeing a shotgun only after he was arrested.

Not surprisingly, the two juries' rejected Dunn's self-defense alibi. He fully deserved the sentence he received for taking an innocent life.

That's the real world. Impartial review of the evidence coupled with the legal basis for self-defense illustrates why two capable juries could only find as they did. Dunn acted in self-defense only in an alternate reality in which the legal definition of self-defense is malleable and the suspect's alibi trumps the evidence.

Finally, to the larger point in this thread, this case is a good example that the self-defense argument has limits as understood from legal precedents. Actual or imminent threat to one's life or of serious injury must exist (it didn't in this case, as one was dealing with unarmed teens who were attacked when leaving the scene of the argument).
 
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Your posts constantly display a kind of dismissive victimhood that is unbecoming the strong nation America is. If people don't trust you - your nation, or you personally - then yes, it's your own fault that you've given people reason not to trust you or not done enough to gain their trust. Is it always right or fair - no - but it is what it is.

As I thought, you think we have it coming. For A Canadian you seem a bit right of center but when all is said and done you are at root a Canadian and as such hold animosity towards America. Here we are calling that the Lilliputian complex and it is not just Canadians but countries all over the world that suffer this psychological condition. You may want to label this "dismissive victimhood" but it is just the reality of being the worlds superpower and I would rather be Gulliver than a Lilliputian.
 
Throw them to the wolves huh.

If a country that someone else was a citizen of allowed "honor killings" should that person be allowed to do the same thing on US soil? Hell no. And I know you wouldn't agree to that either. You'd tell that other country where to stick their laws and demand that person be tried on US soil under US laws. And you'd be right to. What happened with these people is no different.
 
Throw them to the wolves huh.

The contractors are protected under the US-Iraq status of forces agreement like soldiers. I don't agree with this, but I get it. Companies should not be operating like this is War Inc.
 
If a country that someone else was a citizen of allowed "honor killings" should that person be allowed to do the same thing on US soil? Hell no. And I know you wouldn't agree to that either. You'd tell that other country where to stick their laws and demand that person be tried on US soil under US laws. And you'd be right to. What happened with these people is no different.

The difference is that the US has a very good legal system firmly in place while Iraq is a complete mess in every way and turning these guys over to them would be a travesty.
 
The difference is that the US has a very good legal system firmly in place while Iraq is a complete mess in every way and turning these guys over to them would be a travesty.

We turned Saddam over to them. That seemed to go ok.
 
As I thought, you think we have it coming. For A Canadian you seem a bit right of center but when all is said and done you are at root a Canadian and as such hold animosity towards America. Here we are calling that the Lilliputian complex and it is not just Canadians but countries all over the world that suffer this psychological condition. You may want to label this "dismissive victimhood" but it is just the reality of being the worlds superpower and I would rather be Gulliver than a Lilliputian.

It has nothing to do with being the worlds super power. It has to do with the actions we have taken. Tell me, can you tell me the last time that the US was at peace? IE: Not in a war? Here's a list to help ya.
 
The difference is that the US has a very good legal system firmly in place while Iraq is a complete mess in every way and turning these guys over to them would be a travesty.

What kind of court system they have is not relevant. All you're doing is making excuses. They did the crime there, they face the consequences there.
 
The contractors are protected under the US-Iraq status of forces agreement like soldiers. I don't agree with this, but I get it. Companies should not be operating like this is War Inc.

Tell Obama that.

"Earlier this week Stars and Stripes, the Pentagon-run newspaper and website, posted an article calling for contractors to fight ISIS and provide other services in Iraq.
The notice stated that during the initial 12-month contract, they would focus on training management, public affairs, logistics, personnel management, communications, planning and operations, infrastructure management, intelligence, and executive development."
 
We turned Saddam over to them. That seemed to go ok.

Yes we gladly threw him to the wolves. It was like "give him a fair trial and then hang him". That would not be the "justice" I would like to see for the Blackwater guys though.
 
Tell Obama that.

"Earlier this week Stars and Stripes, the Pentagon-run newspaper and website, posted an article calling for contractors to fight ISIS and provide other services in Iraq.
The notice stated that during the initial 12-month contract, they would focus on training management, public affairs, logistics, personnel management, communications, planning and operations, infrastructure management, intelligence, and executive development."

I hear you on that. I am not exactly a fan of our foreign policy. We have an military. We spend a lot of money on that military. Use them. Private contractors should not be the face of our presence and help in the ME.
 
I hear you on that. I am not exactly a fan of our foreign policy. We have an military. We spend a lot of money on that military. Use them. Private contractors should not be the face of our presence and help in the ME.

It is a way of having boots on the ground somewhat covertly and retaining plausible deniability.
 
They have the same rights in that country as everyone else in that country. Just because you're a US citizen does not mean that you have the same rights as a US citizen in anyone else's country. You obey the law of the land in the country that you are in and suffer the consequences of that country if you don't.

Lets put it this way. If a country that someone else was a citizen of allowed "honor killings" should that person be allowed to do the same thing on US soil? Hell no. And I know you wouldn't agree to that either. You'd tell that other country where to stick their laws and demand that person be tried on US soil under US laws. And you'd be right to. What happened with these people is no different.

You do if you're working for the United States government. That protection is probably in their contract. I know I wouldn't sign a contract without out it.
 
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