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Corps opens hearing into Afghanistan shooting

CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. — After 10 months of waiting, the Marine Special Operations unit accused of shooting more than a dozen Afghan civilians after an ambush there finally had its first day in court.

Allegations of lying witnesses, faulty military investigations and a lack of evidence set the tone for the opening of a military court of inquiry into the March 4 incident, involving a Marine spec-ops platoon operating in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar Province. A seldom-used process that can replace an Article 32 investigation, the hearing began here Monday afternoon and is expected to last for two weeks.

The court could easily rule that the investigation into the shootout that followed the attack on a convoy of Marines from Fox Company, Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command, is so flawed that it should not be relied on as evidence, said Knox Nunnally, a civilian attorney for Capt. Vincent Noble, 29, the platoon commander and convoy leader. Noble and Maj. Fred Galvin, 38, who was Fox Company’s commander at the time, are the main focus of the inquiry.

The pair, along with six others in the company, were sent back to Camp Lejeune shortly after the entire 120-man company was pulled from Afghanistan following the attack and subsequent firefight, which some reports claim ended with the death of 19 Afghan civilians. Galvin and the company’s top enlisted officer were relieved of their duties by MarSOC officials.

The two men have not been charged with any crimes, but the court will consider whether they should be charged with conspiracy to make a false official statement, false official statement, failure to obey a lawful order and dereliction of duty.

The inquiry began in a small courtroom, its walls peppered with photographic evidence that will be presented throughout the proceeding. Witnesses are expected to begin testifying on Tuesday.

One person on the witness list is an Air Force colonel initially assigned to file a report on the incident. Nunnally said the colonel sought the advice of Army and Navy officials, who examined photographs of vehicles in the convoy. Those officials said that there were signs of bullet strikes in the second vehicle in the convoy, indicating that the Marines also took fire, but the colonel omitted that information from his report, Nunnally said.

While Fox company Marines were “kept for hours at a time” for questioning by Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents, Afghan witnesses were handled with “kid gloves,” Nunnally said. He also said there were very poor — if any — attempts to verify claims that civilians died or were injured as a direct result of Marines shooting them.

“There was no exhuming of bodies,” he said. “No autopsies.”

Galvin’s civilian attorney, Mark Waple, asked the panel to direct an investigation into civilians who received condolence payments from the U.S. government. During the course of their interviews, two civilians said they were told by village elders to lie about being shot at by the Marines, Waple said.

He also asked the court of find out exactly who was inside a blue Toyota Prado pricked with bullet holes. Waple said there is reason to believe that three or four of the men inside were either Taliban or Taliban sympathizers.