Split Verdict in Abu Ghraib Case
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
FORT MEADE, Md. — A military court today acquitted an Army officer of failing to control American soldiers accused of abusing detainees at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison, but it found him guilty of disobeying an order.
Lieutenant Colonel Steven L. Jordan was the only officer and the last of 12 defendants to go to trial in the Abu Ghraib 2003 scandal that embarrassed the Pentagon and shocked the Muslim world.
The allegations of detainee abuse at the American-run prison first came to light with the release of pictures of American soldiers smiling while detainees, often naked, were held in painful and humiliating positions at the prison. Mr. Jordan, 51, never appeared in the inflammatory photos but he was accused of fostering a climate conducive to abuse.
