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  Date / Time: 5/22/2009 7:01 PM UTC

  VETERAN GETS LIFE IN PRISON FOR KILLINGS IN IRAQ
  

  Former soldier gets life in prison for Iraqi slayings
  
  By BRETT BARROUQUERE, Associated Press Writer Brett Barrouquere, 
  Associated Press Writer 1 hr 13 mins ago
  
  PADUCAH, Ky. – An ex-soldier convicted of raping and killing an Iraqi 
  teen and murdering her family has been sentenced to life in prison in 
  a case that drew attention to the emotional and psychological strains 
  on soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  
  Steven Dale Green, 24, of Midland, Texas, was spared the death penalty 
  Thursday after jurors couldn't agree on a punishment for the brutal 
  crime.
  
  In March 2006, after an afternoon of card playing, sex talk and 
  drinking Iraqi whiskey, Pfc. Green and three other soldiers went to 
  the home of 14-year-old Abeer Qassim al-Janabi near Mahmoudiya, about 
  20 miles south of Baghdad. Green shot and killed the teen's mother, 
  father and sister, then became the third soldier to rape the girl 
  before shooting her in the face. Her body was set on fire.
  
  Federal jurors who convicted Green of rape and murder deliberated for 
  more than 10 hours over two days on whether to give Green a death 
  sentence or life in prison without parole. Since they could not 
  unanimously agree on either, life in prison had to be the verdict.
  
  "It's the better of two bad choices," said his father, John Green, who 
  sighed as the verdict was read.
  
  His son will be sentenced Sept. 4 by U.S. District Judge Thomas B. 
  Russell.
  
  In Baghdad, Iraqis said they were shocked and disappointed that Green 
  was not sentenced to death.
  
  "Has Iraqi blood and honor become so cheap, where a family can be 
  murdered and a daughter raped and killed, and the verdict is life 
  imprisonment?" said Tariq Dawood, 55.
  
  Haidar Kadom, 31, a teacher there, called the sentence "a mockery of 
  Iraqi rights."
  
  "If an Iraqi did the same to an American female soldier, he would be 
  regarded as a terrorist and would be sentenced to death," he said.
  
  Green's attorneys never denied his involvement in the attack, instead 
  focusing on building a case that he didn't deserve the death penalty. 
  Former Marines and other soldiers Green served with testified that he 
  faced an unusually stressful combat tour in Iraq's "Triangle of Death" 
  with a unit that suffered heavy casualties and didn't receive 
  sufficient leadership.
  
  Jurors declined to comment as they were escorted out of the 
  courthouse. A civilian jury decided Green's case because he was out of 
  the Army before he was charged.
  
  According to the jury verdict forms, several panelists said the stress 
  Green was under from combat and other areas of his life was a 
  mitigating factor against a death sentence. Just as many cited the 
  Army knowledge that he was having homicidal thoughts.
  
  Other factors included his bad home life, not being tried in a 
  military court like the rest of the defendants and that he was 
  influenced by his superiors during the attack. Two other soldiers 
  convicted in the attack outranked Green and testified against him.
  
  The issue of combat stress resulting from long and traumatic 
  deployments came to the forefront again just as Green's trial was 
  entering the sentencing phase in Kentucky. Thousands of miles away in 
  Iraq, an Army sergeant on his third tour of duty allegedly entered a 
  military mental health clinic May 11 and opened fire on his comrades, 
  killing five, including a doctor who helped soldiers deal with stress.
  
  Green had been deployed for about six months when he attacked the 
  family. About three months before that, enemy attacks over 12 days 
  killed two command sergeants, a lieutenant and a specialist in his unit.
  
  The defense case also focused on the lack of military leadership in 
  the unit and the Army's failure to recognize that Green could act on 
  homicidal thoughts of killing Iraqi civilians that he expressed after 
  several fellow soldiers had been killed.
  
  Green was seen by Army mental health professionals, but a nurse 
  practitioner sent him back to his unit with pills to help him sleep 
  after he showed no signs of planning to act on those feelings, she 
  testified.
  
  The trial was held in western Kentucky because Green was a member of 
  the 101st Airborne Division, based at Fort Campbell, Ky.
  
  Assistant U.S. Attorney Marisa Ford said in a statement that 
  prosecutors have "the utmost respect" for the jury's sentencing 
  decision.
  
  One of Green's attorneys, Darren Wolff of Louisville, said his client 
  twice offered to plead guilty, but the U.S. Justice Department refused 
  amid international pressure for a conviction.
  
  "Mr. Green will spend the rest of his life in jail and the events of 
  March 12, 2006, have forever changed the lives of many," Wolff said. 
  "It is a tragic case on so many levels."
  
  Green's brother, Doug Green, 26, said the jury reached the appropriate 
  decision.
  
  "I do think it gives him a chance to have some semblance of a life," 
  he said. "We're grateful for that."
  
  But Qais Aboud Ali Khutri al-Janabi, the head of a prominent Sunni 
  clan in Mahmoudiya where the girl and her family were killed, said 
  justice had not been done.
  
  "We demand this trial be held again and a death penalty issued," he 
  said.
  
  ___
  
  Associated Press Writers Kristin M. Hall in Paducah and Hamid Ahmed in 
  Baghdad contributed to this report.
  
  
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