Marine pleads guilty

Camp Pendleton, Calif.

A Marine corporal helped kidnap and murder an unarmed Iraqi because he and his fellow Marines were “sick and tired of getting bombed,” the corporal testified this week. Trent Thomas, 25, admitted that he and seven other soldiers shot Hashim Ibrahim Awad to death in Iraq last April, then arranged his body to suggest that he had been killed while planting a roadside bomb. Awad, 52, pleaded for his life as he was led to his death, Thomas said. “He started asking, ‘Why, mister, why?’” Thomas said. “We didn’t say anything.” Thomas pleaded guilty to murder. Four others in his unit have pleaded guilty to lesser offenses, and three are awaiting trial for murder and other charges.

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