Lawyer wants to call top commander as witness

THE lawyer for Lynndie England, the US soldier pictured in humiliating photos of Iraqi detainees, asked a judge yesterday if he could call as a witness in her hearing the top US commander in Iraq, Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez.

As the military hearing for England entered its fourth day, defence lawyer Rick Hernandez also asked the judge if he could call Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, who ran Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison where the photos were taken. The judge, Colonel Denise Arn, was noncommittal and said it would be handled later.

Colonel Arn is holding the hearing at Fort Bragg in North Carolina to decide whether England, a reservist, should be court martialled on 13 counts of abusing detainees and six counts stemming from possession of sexually explicit photos.

If convicted, the pregnant 21-year-old could get up to 38 years in prison.

Army intelligence analyst Israel Rivera testified that he was disgusted by the sight of guards forcing prisoners to crawl naked across a floor but chose not to tell his superiors about the abuse.