Navy Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher, right, walks with his wife, Andrea Gallagher as they arrive to military court on Naval Base San Diego, Monday, June 24, 2019, in San Diego. Trial continues in the court-martial of the decorated Navy SEAL, who is accused of stabbing to death a wounded teenage Islamic State prisoner and wounding two civilians in Iraq in 2017. He has pleaded not guilty to murder and attempted murder, charges that carry a potential life sentence. (AP Photo/Julie Watson)
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Defense lawyers planned to go on the offensive Wednesday in the murder trial of a decorated Navy SEAL charged with killing a wounded young Islamic State prisoner in Iraq and shooting at civilians.
The prosecution rested its case Tuesday in the San Diego court-martial of Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher, a Bronze Star recipient. The judge in the case rejected a defense request to issue a summary judgment finding Gallagher not guilty of murder and attempted murder.
On Wednesday, the defense planned to show jurors videotaped testimony from an Iraqi general who handed over the fighter to Gallagher for medical treatment after the adolescent was wounded in an airstrike. The general gave videotaped testimony in June when he visited San Diego.
Prosecution witnesses, including a fellow Navy SEAL, testified that Gallagher stabbed the prisoner twice in the neck in May 2017 and that the attack could have been fatal.
Defense lawyers say testimony from the Iraqi general and other witnesses will show Gallagher isn’t guilty. They already have contended that the witnesses against him offered tainted or even false testimony. They have questioned the methodology of the chief investigator and noted the lack of a body or other physical evidence.
Prosecutors called seven SEALs from the platoon to testify in the court-martial at Naval Base San Diego that started a week ago
One witness, Corey Scott, a medic, shocked the courtroom last week after he admitted to the killing, saying he plugged the militant’s breathing tube after Gallagher stabbed the boy as an act of mercy because he feared he would be tortured and possibly killed by Iraqi forces if he survived.
On Tuesday, a computer specialist testified that Gallagher had texted a photo to a comrade in which he clutched the hair of the dead captive in one hand and a knife in the other.
The specialist also linked Gallagher to a text message sent to a comrade that bragged: “Got him with my hunting knife.”
Defense attorney Timothy Parlatore called the photos of Gallagher posing with the corpse in poor taste but not criminal. Several of the same SEALs who had testified against Gallagher also posed with the dead body in a platoon photo, he noted.
No blood was found on the knife.
Gallagher, 40, has pleaded not guilty to murder in the case of the prisoner and attempted murder for his alleged shooting of a young girl and elderly man in separate incidents outside Mosul. The defense said the shooting incidents were based on the accounts of one SEAL and one former SEAL who never saw Gallagher pull the trigger.
Fellow defense lawyer Marc Mukasey suggested earlier Tuesday that the lead investigator, a special agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, Joseph Warpinski, befriended witnesses and encouraged them to speak with each other and go after Gallagher in violation of standard investigation practices.
Warpinski acknowledged making some mistakes in the hundreds of text messages he exchanged with witnesses, but denied making friends with them or encouraging them to discuss the case to get their stories straight or to target the chief. He said he had to build rapport with members of the insular special forces community to earn their trust and cooperation.
Mukasey also suggested Warpinski had not asked pertinent questions of witnesses, such as the cause of death of the captive fighter and why Gallagher, an 18-year veteran and trained medic, would suddenly kill a patient he was treating for battle wounds.
Scott testified that he thought the patient would have survived the stabbing, despite previously telling the prosecution his life could not have been saved.
By JULIE WATSON and BRIAN MELLEY
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