San Diego: A decorated US Navy SEAL on Tuesday was cleared of charges for the killing a wounded teenage Islamic State fighter under his care in Iraq in 2017.
The verdict was met with an outpour of emotion as the military jury also cleared Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher, who was charged with the attempted murder of two Iraqi civilians and also posing for photos beside the corpse of the captive Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group fighter.
If he was proven guilty of murder he would have faced life imprisonment but he would only face a maximum sentence of four months. However, he was allowed to walk out free following Tuesday's verdict on account of nine months that he served in pre-trial confinement.
The case exposed a generational conflict within the ranks of the elite special operations forces and the outcome dealt a major blow to the prosecution of one of the Navy's most high-profile war crimes cases.
After the verdict was read, the defence attorneys jumped up from their seats as Gallagher turned and embraced his wife over the bar of the gallery.
Gallagher, dressed in a Navy white uniform and sporting a chest full of medals, told reporters outside court that he was happy and thankful. "I thank God, and my legal team and my wife," he said.
Further, he declined to address questions about his SEAL team. His lawyers said that he might talk after the jury decides his sentence, which could happen as early as Wednesday.
His wife, Andrea Gallagher, who was by his side throughout the court-martial said she was elated. "I want to thank the American public. You cannot do this without the support of the American public who funded our legal defence because they knew that there was something not right about this," she said before the couple drove away from Naval Base San Diego in a white convertible Mustang to start celebrating.
Defence lawyers said that Gallagher was framed by junior disgruntled platoon members who fabricated the allegations to oust their chief and the lead investigator built the probe around their stories instead of seeking the truth.
They said that there was no physical evidence to support the allegations because no corpse was ever recovered and examined by a pathologist.
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