Children testify of horror in Afghan massacre trial
A courtroom sketch shows seven-year-old Zardana, who was shot in the head during the March 2012 massacres in Afghanistan and nearly died, testifies via video link in the military trial of Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, Saturday, Nov. 10, 2012. / Lois Silver/CBS News
JOINT BASE LEWIS-McCHORD, Wash. Little Robina took her seat wearing a deep-red head covering and a nervous smile, ready to tell her story. She giggled as any 7-year-old in the spotlight might.
But when the questions began, what she recalled seemed impossibly dark: how she hid behind her father when the gunman came to their village that night, how the stranger fired, and how her father died, cursing in pain and anger.
"I was standing behind my father," she testified simply, by video feed from Afghanistan Saturday night during a hearing for the soldier accused of killing 16 civilians, including nine children, in Kandahar Province. "He shot my father."
One of the bullets struck her in the leg, but she didn't realize it right away, she said.
Her testimony came on the second overnight session of the preliminary hearing for Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, who prosecutors say slipped away from his base to attack two villages. The slayings drew such angry protests that the U.S. temporarily halted combat operations in Afghanistan, and it was three weeks before American investigators could reach the crime scenes.
A courtroom sketch shows Staff Sgt. Robert Bales listening to Afghan villagers testify via video link at his military trial, Saturday, Nov. 10, 2012.
/ Lois Silver/CBS NewsThe stories recounted by the villagers have been harrowing. They described torched bodies, a son finding his wounded father, and boys cowering behind a curtain while others screamed "We are children! We are children!"
Bales sat quietly throughout, betraying no reaction to what he heard.
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Robina's friend, Zardana, now 8, also testified, but only briefly to describe what the shooter was wearing.
Zardana suffered a gunshot wound to the top of her head, and when she arrived at a nearby military base, the doctors focused on treating the other injured victims first. They figured Zardana had no chance of surviving.
After two months at a military hospital in Afghanistan and three more at a Navy hospital in San Diego, she can walk and talk again.
Before she testified, Zardana sat at the witness table sipping from a pink juice box through a pink straw. A loose head covering and a barrette held her dark brown hair out of her face.
The hearing at Joint Base Lewis-McChord is meant to help determine whether Bales, 39, will face a court-martial in the deaths. He could face the death penalty if he is convicted.
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Sad huh????
I am so glad the arm-chair warriors here think they understand what is going through these soldier's brains.. or lack of brains after the damage they have had done to them... I just get frustrated when I see the hypocrisy of the media, civilians and politicians bleating on about how awful the troop suicides, homeless mental troops, brain damaged wounded warrior troops are..... yet when the EXACT issues come up that are warned over and over and over again --- then it is "hang him"... hypocrites... The guy should not have been sent back there....
Why not leave it to the Afghan courts ? After all it was on their soil...
It's up to the victims to determine true justice...