Orchestrated tales in ex-Blackwater guards' trial?

Source: AP-Excite

By PETE YOST

WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense lawyers for the ex-Blackwater security guards accused of killing 14 Iraqis in Baghdad nearly seven years ago are raising the possibility that prosecution witnesses, with direction from Iraqi law enforcement investigators, have orchestrated their stories.

The defense has been bedeviled by the fact that no one has come forward to support its self-defense theory — that the guards acted because they were under attack.

The most prevalent explanation since the shootings on Sept. 16, 2007, is that there were no incoming shots.

The carnage at Nisoor Square turned out to be the darkest episode of contractor violence during the war and inflamed anti-American feelings around the world. The trial, which began June 11 and is expected to last months, could feature the largest group of foreign witnesses ever to travel to the U.S. to participate in a criminal trial, according to the Justice Department.

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Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20140621/us-blackwater-trial-77b4098ef8.html

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FILE - This Sept. 25, 2007 file photo shows an Iraqi traffic policeman inspecting a car destroyed by a Blackwater security detail in al-Nisoor Square in Baghdad, Iraq. In a tale of death and destruction, a federal prosecutor has chronicled for a jury the alleged conduct of four Blackwater security guards accused of killing 14 Iraqis and wounding 18 others in downtown Baghdad nearly seven years ago. In opening statements Tuesday at the trial of the four guards, Assistant U.S. Attorney T. Patrick Martin said the victims were simply trying to get out of the way of gunfire from the Blackwater guards. (AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed, File)