Special Operations Chief Edward “Eddie” Gallagher, a highly decorated Navy SEAL, is fighting murder charges tied to the death of an Islamic State militant in Iraq. (photos provided)
By: Carl Prine
Chinks are appearing in the NCIS case against SOC Gallagher, in the form of two senior members of the elite Iraqi Emergency Response Division, and their interviews.
Two high-ranking Iraqi military leaders with close ties to the SEALs cast doubt on the case military prosecutors have formed against Special Operations Chief Edward “Eddie” Gallagher, who’s accused of murdering a wounded prisoner of war, according to records provided to Navy Times.
Their transcribed interviews contradict nearly every aspect of the federal case against Gallagher, 39, who faces up to 18 criminal counts, including premeditated murder for allegedly stabbing to death a badly wounded Islamic State detainee near the Iraqi city of Mosul on May 3, 2017.
A report prepared by the Naval Criminal Investigate Service on Oct. 22 — five weeks after Gallagher was arrested by federal agents and incarcerated in the Naval Consolidated Brig Miramar in San Diego — includes an interview in Baghdad with Iraqi Emergency Response Division commander Maj. Gen. Abbas al-Jubouri and his aide, Col. Issa Kadhim.
The ERD is the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior’s elite special forces unit, and both al-Jubouri and Kadhim worked closely with Gallagher’s SEAL platoon during anti-Islamic State clearing operations in northern Iraq in 2017.
Although painted by prosecutors as a sadistic SEAL sniper who took pot shots at Iraqi civilians, including children, al-Jubouri considered “Chief Ed” to be “always professional and I always worked so close to him,” according to his translated interview with an NCIS agent.
There’s a lot of this explosive article left to read. Don’t miss it at The Navy Times
Pecos Bill
The missing Argentinian submarine has been discovered 2,600 feet deep in the Atlantic Ocean.
