Bank-robbery suspect wants to put government on trial (Army Ranger vs war crimes)

Ranger alleges war crimes
Bank-robbery suspect wants to put government on trial

By PAUL SHUKOVSKY
P-I REPORTER

An Army Ranger accused of holding up a Tacoma bank plans to use the notoriety of his case to reveal what he characterizes as systematic war crimes -- rapes, homicides and political assassinations -- committed by American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Spc. Elliott Sommer is allegedly part of a four-member Ranger crew from Fort Lewis involved in the armed robbery Aug. 7 of a Bank of America branch, court documents show.
(clip)
Sommer said he wants to use extradition proceedings in Canada to put the U.S. government on trial. "We are looking to be able to prosecute 30 to 40 members of Task Force 626 for war crimes, including rape, murder, et cetera," Sommer said in a telephone interview this week.
(clip)
"That is a bad policy. Those policies are what I'm standing up against." Sommer recalled one instance in which he helped a CIA officer and a Delta Force sergeant load two 105 mm howitzer shells into a vehicle in Baghdad's Green Zone. He learned later that they detonated the shells, killing four men -- one of whom was a radical Islamic politician who was the front-runner for elective office.

Sommer also spoke of U.S. forces sending captives "to hell -- the Battlefield Interrogation Facility." "There are people in the BIF who have been there since the beginning of the war who are probably innocent. The place is worse than Abu Ghraib (prison)."...(more@link)