Military hearing begins for accused Army deserter Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl
The United States Army laid out its case Thursday for court-martialing Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl on charges of desertion and endangering other soldiers, the Associated Press reports.
Bergdahl, a 29-year-old man from Idaho, was part of a high-profile prisoner exchange with the Taliban in 2014. The exchange became a political issue, in part because Bergdahl was alleged to have voluntarily deserted his post in 2009. He was captured by the Taliban and held five years.
In San Antonio today, the Army held an Article 32 hearing—a little like a preliminary hearing—to determine whether Bergdahl should face a court-martial for desertion and misbehavior before the enemy. According to the New York Times, “misbehavior before the enemy” is a little-used and hard-to-prove charge that means Bergdahl is accused of endangering his fellow soldiers and creating an otherwise unnecessary search and rescue operation. The hearing could last several days.
Bergdahl’s misgivings about the war in Afghanistan, in which he was serving, were not a secret before he vanished. Prosecutor Maj. Margaret Kurz said that Bergdahl had been planning for weeks to leave his post and even sent emails beforehand to his family and friends.
His platoon leader, Capt. John Billings, told the military court about the weeks of searching for Bergdahl in the high Afghanistan heat and often without much food or sleep. Thousands of soldiers took part in the search over 45 days, the article says. His company commander, Maj. Silvino Silvino, said some of those soldiers were angry at Bergdahl’s alleged desertion. No one is alleged to have died in the search, the Times said, but a retired Navy SEAL has publicly said he was seriously wounded. There are no allegations that during Bergdahl’s captivity he engaged in any wrongdoing or aided the Taliban.
The articles did not report any testimony by Bergdahl. His defense team is led by Professor Eugene Fidell of Yale Law School, who declined to comment to the media but has said publicly that the highly negative publicity surrounding the prisoner exchange could influence the case. The Times said Fidell has cited an Army investigation that determined that Bergdahl did not intend to desert, and that he’d instead left his post to report “disturbing circumstances” to the “nearest general officer.” Fidell had asked that Bergdahl’s interviews with investigators be made public.
The hearing takes place under new rules intended to limit cross-examinations of sexual-assault victims, but which apply in all cases, the Times said. Those rules could make it tougher to find probable cause for a court-martial.
The hearing could last several days, the AP says, and the final decision about whether to convene a court-martial will be made by Gen. Robert Abrams of the U.S. Army Forces Command.
