US soldier charged with murder of family in Iraq

US federal prosecutors yesterday charged a veteran of the Iraq war with murder and rape following an investigation into the killing of an Iraqi woman and members of her family.

Steven Green, a 21-year-old former private first class who was discharged from the US Army, appeared in a federal magistrate’s courtroom in Charlotte, Virginia.

Prosecutors said Green and other soldiers entered the home of a family of Iraqi civilians, where they raped a member of the family before Green shot her and three of her relatives.

The FBI said its agents arrested Green on Friday in Marion, North Carolina.

The case is being handled by US federal prosecutors because Green has been discharged from the Army.

Green had served with the 101st Airborne, based at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

According to an affidavit filed along with the criminal complaint, Green was discharged “before this incident came to light. Green was discharged due to a personality disorder.”

The affidavit, filed by the FBI, said Green and three other soldiers from the 101st’s 502nd Infantry Regiment were working at a traffic checkpoint in Mahmoudiya on March 12 when they conspired to rape a woman who lived nearby.

According to the affidavit’s account, the soldiers changed their clothes before going to the woman’s residence to avoid detection.

One of the soldiers said he witnessed another soldier and Green rape the woman.

“After the rape, [the soldier] witnessed Green shoot the woman in the head two to three times,” the affidavit said.

Green faces a possible death sentence if convicted of murder.