U.S. Soldier Guilty of Killing Iraqi Teen

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A U.S. soldier pleaded guilty Friday to killing a severely wounded 16-year-old Iraqi, the military said.

Staff Sgt. Johnny M. Horne Jr., 30, of Winston-Salem, N.C., was charged with the Aug. 18 murder in Baghdad's Sadr City, the scene of fierce clashes earlier this year between coalition forces and Shiite rebels allied to firebrand anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

The military said Horne was expected to be sentenced Friday.
...
"The convictions stemmed from Staff Sgt. Horne's murder of a severely wounded Iraqi civilian in Baghdad's Sadr City district," a military statement said.

Previous military court hearings have heard that several troops fired on a group of Iraqi men placing homemade bombs along a road in Sadr City, an impoverished Baghdad neighborhood.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20041210/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_soldier_guilty

The compassionate thing would not to be there causing needless death in the first place.