FORT HOOD, Tex., Jan. 14 - The Army reservist accused of being the ringleader in the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal was found guilty on all charges by a military jury here Friday night, a year to the day after the Pentagon began an investigation into photographs showing Iraqi detainees bound and brutalized or forced into sexually humiliating positions.
The jury of 10 soldiers deliberated for five hours before convicting the reservist, Specialist Charles A. Graner Jr., on all but one count of aggravated assault, which it reduced to battery.
Graner is facing 15 years, with the sentencing phase already begun.
Of course this is really the least that should happen as a result of Abu Ghraib and related atrocities, but it's a start. Going forward, we should maybe go after the Secretary of Defense and... oh, I don't know, maybe not confirm one of the main architects of this barbarism as our next Attorney General.
