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Thu 6 May, 2004 09:12 am
This guy makes me wonder if he is an immature idiot behaving like a horny teenaged boy or is he a pervert? ---BBB
Guardsman Probed for Iraq Naked Soldier Photos
Wed May 5, 2004
By Adam Tanner
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The head of a U.S. military police unit at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison is under investigation following charges he secretly photographed naked female American soldiers, officials said on Wednesday.
Capt. Leo Merck, 32, a member of the California National Guard who commanded the 124-strong 870th Military Police Company, is under U.S. Army investigation and has been relieved of duty, they said.
"He was their commander and he led them into Iraq. While he was there this alleged incident happened," California National Guard spokesman Andrew Hughan said.
Merck, a veteran of the first Gulf War who worked as a financial analyst before going to Iraq, is suspected of photographing the soldiers as they showered. The Guard said complaints were made against Merck in November. His unit arrived in Iraq in May a year ago.
The incident is the latest embarrassment for the U.S. occupying force in Iraq. In recent days media worldwide has aired pictures of grinning soldiers abusing naked male Iraqi prisoners at the same prison that was once used by Saddam Hussein's torturers.
Merck, who is married and resides in Fremont, California, a suburb of San Francisco, is at an undisclosed location under U.S. Army control. "The U.S. Army justice system is working its wheels," Hughan said.
The Contra Costa Times, which broke the story on Wednesday, quoted Spc. Myrna Hernandez, 26, as saying she saw Merck photograph her as she was showering with two other women.
"I saw a guy get on all fours with a digital camera in his hands. His head was going under the wall, and we made eye contact," she told the newspaper. "I was in shock, like what do I do now?"
Merck worked as a senior financial analyst at San Jose, California-based KLA-Tencor Corp, a firm specializing in equipment that finds defects in computer chips. He had an MBA degree from the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks.
"At this time the company thinks it's inappropriate to comment," said KLA-Tencor spokesman Kern Beare. A woman at his family home in North Dakota declined to comment.
Merck first enlisted in the National Guard in 1989 and had received a series of decorations and service medals.
How a financial analyst could become CO of an MP National Guard unit is reason enough to question the sanity of his superiors. That he took pictures of these women au naturale isn't surprising. He probably wanted to remember what a woman looked like, being separated from his wife for so long.
Granted he acted like a prepubecent teen with raging hormones, but hey, he's only human right? Can you blame him if these ladies were in the shower when he decided to try out his camera? Can you blame him for bad timing on taking pictures of leaky showers? It's not his fault, just ask him.
Does he have a problem? You bet, a society that has standards of how to behave and a total lack of self control. Actually he has several problems, but there is one small redeeming factor...he didn't rape any of them.
He now has to face not only the humiliation of having this act spread all over the world via news media, gossip and the internet, but his family. Imagine what his female family members think and feel towards him. Or male children that may have thought he was some kind of role model. Legal punishments aside, he'll live with this for life and he desrves it!
Wiyaka wrote:How a financial analyst could become CO of an MP National Guard unit is reason enough to question the sanity of his superiors.
Not really. Just because he is brtanched MP in the Guard doesn't mean he has to have anything to do with police work in civvy street. He likely did ROTC to help pay for university, and accepted a commision with a nearby guard unit. As an officer, his primary reason for existing is to do paperwork.
Quote: That he took pictures of these women au naturale isn't surprising. He probably wanted to remember what a woman looked like, being separated from his wife for so long.
Sex is freely available when deployed. He could probably have been quite successful at getting laid, and likely was.
Quote:Granted he acted like a prepubecent teen with raging hormones, but hey, he's only human right? Can you blame him if these ladies were in the shower when he decided to try out his camera? Can you blame him for bad timing on taking pictures of leaky showers? It's not his fault, just ask him.
Buried in the sarcasm here is an important point: military culture encourages pseudo-adolescent behaviour.
Quote:Does he have a problem? You bet, a society that has standards of how to behave and a total lack of self control. Actually he has several problems, but there is one small redeeming factor...he didn't rape any of them.
Yup, but I know many women who would say that what happened was the next worst thing.
Quote:He now has to face not only the humiliation of having this act spread all over the world via news media, gossip and the internet, but his family. Imagine what his female family members think and feel towards him. Or male children that may have thought he was some kind of role model. Legal punishments aside, he'll live with this for life and he desrves it!
Indeed.
Uh, I think Wiyaka was being ironic.
roger wrote:Uh, I think Wiyaka was being ironic.
Being a country girl, I have to ask if that has anything to do with a blacksmith pounding iron on the anvil?
Actually, I was trying to be facetious.
hobitbob wrote:Wiyaka wrote:How a financial analyst could become CO of an MP National Guard unit is reason enough to question the sanity of his superiors.
Not really. Just because he is brtanched MP in the Guard doesn't mean he has to have anything to do with police work in civvy street. He likely did ROTC to help pay for university, and accepted a commision with a nearby guard unit. As an officer, his primary reason for existing is to do paperwork.
Quote:
Agreed, but that job is usually left to the XO (Executive Officer), if compatenet.
Quote: That he took pictures of these women au naturale isn't surprising. He probably wanted to remember what a woman looked like, being separated from his wife for so long.
Quote:Sex is freely available when deployed. He could probably have been quite successful at getting laid, and likely was.
Again I agree that sex can be readily available by an occupying force, so why the pictures? He wasn't on his knees praying...or was he?
Quote:Granted he acted like a prepubecent teen with raging hormones, but hey, he's only human right? Can you blame him if these ladies were in the shower when he decided to try out his camera? Can you blame him for bad timing on taking pictures of leaky showers? It's not his fault, just ask him.
Quote:Buried in the sarcasm here is an important point: military culture encourages pseudo-adolescent behaviour.
Somethings never change do they?
Quote:Does he have a problem? You bet, a society that has standards of how to behave and a total lack of self control. Actually he has several problems, but there is one small redeeming factor...he didn't rape any of them.
Quote:Yup, but I know many women who would say that what happened was the next worst thing.
As a woman, I argee wholeheartedly. One woman in four
has been raped, here in the US and those are the reported cases.
Quote:He now has to face not only the humiliation of having this act spread all over the world via news media, gossip and the internet, but his family. Imagine what his female family members think and feel towards him. Or male children that may have thought he was some kind of role model. Legal punishments aside, he'll live with this for life and he desrves it!
Indeed.
"facetious" Yeah, but I knew how to spell ironic.
Hey, stick around, Wiyaka. We'll probably enjoy your company, whether you like us or not.
Since the women were likely Muslims, there's an obvious ignorance of what it means to be photographed in the nude (it's nothing short of rape). They are supposedly following orders but one of those obviously isn't to hide their disdain for the religion or the Iraqis as equal human beings. I would venture to guess that there is too high a percentage of military personnel in Iraq who are bigots or closet bigots.
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