[Peace-discuss] Violence spills in all directions

[Barbara kessel]

mentioned in the AWARE meeting Sunday night...

Report: 121 Veterans Linked to Killings
A U.S. army soldier from Ghostrider Company, 3rd Squadron, 2nd Stryker
Cavalry Regiment runs for cover during Operation Phantom Phoenix in
the village of Abu Musa on the northern outskirts of Muqdadiyah, in
the volatile Diyala province, about 90 kilometers (60 miles) north of
Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Jan. MARKO DROBNJAKOVIC
>From Associated Press
January 13, 2008 7:12 AM EST

NEW YORK - At least 121 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans have
committed a killing or been charged in one in the United States after
returning from combat, The New York Times reported Sunday.

The newspaper said it also logged 349 homicides involving all
active-duty military personnel and new veterans in the six years since
military action began in Afghanistan, and later Iraq. That represents
an 89-percent increase over the previous six-year period, the
newspaper said.

About three-quarters of those homicides involved Iraq and Afghanistan
war veterans, the newspaper said. The report did not illuminate the
exact relationship between those cases and the 121 killings also
mentioned in the report.

The newspaper said its research involved searching local news reports,
examining police, court and military records and interviewing
defendants, their lawyers and families, victims' families and military
and law enforcement officials.

Defense Department representatives did not immediately respond to a
telephone message early Sunday. The Times said the military agency
declined to comment, saying it could not reproduce the paper's
research.

A military spokesman, Lt. Col. Les Melnyk, questioned the report's
premise and research methods, the newspaper said. He said it
aggregated crimes ranging from involuntary manslaughter to murder, and
he suggested the apparent increase in homicides involving military
personnel and veterans in the wartime period might reflect only "an
increase in awareness of military service by reporters since 9/11."

Neither the Pentagon nor the federal Justice Department track such
killings, generally prosecuted in state civilian courts, according to
the Times.

The 121 killings ranged from shootings and stabbings to bathtub
drownings and fatal car crashes resulting from drunken driving, the
newspaper said. All but one of those implicated was male.

About a third of the victims were girlfriends or relatives, including
a 2-year-old girl slain by her 20-year-old father while he was
recovering from wounds sustained in Iraq.

A quarter of the victims were military personnel. One was stabbed and
set afire by fellow soldiers a day after they all returned from Iraq.