Italian court throws out case against Mario Lozano
Via the Jawa Report, good news for an American soldier:
A court on Thursday threw out the case against a U.S. soldier charged in the 2005 shooting of an Italian intelligence agent in Iraq, a killing that infuriated Italians and soured relations with Washington.
The court agreed with the defense argument that Italy had no jurisdiction in the case of Spc. Mario Lozano, a member of the New York-based 69th Infantry Regiment on trial in absentia on charges of murder and attempted murder for the shooting of Nicola Calipari, hailed as a hero by Italians for his role in the rescue of a kidnapped Italian journalist.
Prosecutor Pietro Saviotti said he would decide whether to appeal the ruling after the judges make public their reasoning within 60 days.
Calipari was shot on March 4, 2005, at a checkpoint near Baghdad airport shortly after securing the release of reporter Giuliana Sgrena.
Sgrena, a reporter for the newspaper Il Manifesto, was seized by gunmen in Baghdad in February 2005. She has said Calipari died trying to shield her body from the bullets.
Sgrena and another agent, who was driving the car, were wounded.
“We’ve given up trying to find the truth about what happened to Nicola Calipari,” Sgrena told reporters at the courthouse on the capital’s outskirts. “The arrogance of America, which never wanted this trial, has won.”
Calipari’s widow, Rosa, told the ANSA news agency that “they have killed Nicola for a second time.”
Lozano, 38, has always denied wrongdoing, saying he had no choice but to fire. He has told U.S. media that he flashed a warning light signaling the vehicle to stop and that he shot first at the ground, and then at the car’s engine.
Go back and read the story in the NYPost on Lozano:
“Anyone inside 100 meters is already in the danger zone . . . and you gotta take them out,” Lozano told The Post from his brother’s Chelsea apartment. “If you hesitate, you come home in a box – and I didn’t want to come home in a box. I did what any soldier would do in my position.”
I mentioned this case last year, when Marine sniper and American patriot Ilarino Pantano took up Spc. Lozano’s cause:
One one-thousand. Two one-thousand. Three one-thousand.
That’s it. That’s how much time U.S. Army Spec. Mario Lozano, a Bronx native, had to decide on Baghdad’s notoriously dangerous Airport Road in March 2005: Shoot or don’t shoot. He chose to shoot a car speeding toward his roadblock late at night with its lights off. Now, if Italian prosecutors have their way, he will face murder charges. Never mind that the American military has cleared him of all wrongdoing. Four lawyers in Rome have signed an extradition request to charge Lozano with the murder of an Italian intelligence officer, alleging the shooting was a “political crime” against their country’s interests.
The real political crime is happening now in Italy, not last year in Iraq. And the true victims are our troops.
There’s a reason I’m particularly sensitive about accusations leveled at those in the cauldron of combat such as the charges being hurled at Lozano and those regarding the Marines involved in the deaths of 24 Iraqis in Haditha.
You see, like Lozano, I’m a New Yorker. I grew up in Hell’s Kitchen. I served in the first Gulf war and then worked at Goldman Sachs.
And in 2004, while leading a platoon of U.S. Marines during fierce fighting in Iraq’s “triangle of death,” I killed two men in combat — only to be charged with premeditated murder for my actions. Threats were made against me and my family. Pictures simulating my decapitation circulated on the Internet.
In the end, following a very public five days in American military court, I was completely exonerated — but only after enduring months of headlines decrying my slaughter of “innocent” Iraqis. Should I have been surprised that there wasn’t nearly as much attention paid to the fact that I was cleared?
Should I have been disappointed that the men I killed were continuously mischaracterized as innocent civilians, even though they tried to attack me after they were caught fleeing a weapons cache containing cash, IDs and Al Qaeda material in a car with hidden compartments for transporting bombs?
Background on anti-American Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena here.
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Oohhh the DRAAAAAMMMMAA. Just my guess, but if they had been killed by an Iraqi “Freedom Fighter” this wouldn’t ever seen a court room.
At least the judge had some sense – shocker!
Arrogance of the Americans!!! Ummm, did someone tell her going to Iraq was dangerous? That perhaps she could be killed? Why didn’t they stop their cars like everyone else at the checkpoints??? Sorry, this is war folks, it aint fair, it ain’t funny and its certainly not a time for pointing fingers at our troops for doing their JOBS!
Arrogance real translation = in Irag, a dangerous war zone driving with no lights and not stopping when ordered to by those in authority….
that is my translation for arrogance. we americans are arrogant, no i think this italian fool was the arrogant one.
My thoughts and prayers go out to this Marine and his family. The stress they have endured due to the Italian Arrogant Snobs.
For Eurpoeans “Arrogant Americans” on the same level as the Democrat’s “It Bush’s Fault”. It is the “go to-cool phrase” none of the LEMINGS will disagree with.
Hallelujah!!! Finally common sense creeps into the judiciary and ends a travesty of justice.
This young man made the same decision I would have made given the same circumstances. No sane person would have allowed that car to continue toward that checkpoint.
It’s better to take the shot and be available to defend yourself in court than to not take the shot and be buried alonside of your buddies.
feebiebabe
agree with you … plus the fact that the car was speeding toward the checkpoint “with its lights off” … stupid people doing stupid things in the middle of a war zone tend to pay the price for their stupidity … besides which, as I recall … there had been no advance notification by the Italians that they had affected the reporters release and were going to be going to the airport with no accompanying security vehicles … I am sorry for the individuals in Italy and their families, just as I would be had they been Americans, but there are strict guidelines that the military follows for this sort of thing … generally that consists of verbal and visual warnings, followed by warning shots, followed by shoot to kill … end of story …
Another American Soldier exonerated from charges leveled by people outside the warzone with a political agenda.
There seems to be a pattern developing……..
Of course, I feel sorry for the families.
But they lost major points with me by telling us Americans we are arrogant – “the nerve…those soldiers who get blown up on a daily basis shooting at a car not following the checkpoint rules!
If any action was arrogant, its thinking the rules don’t apply to THEM…which when looking at the facts here…all signs point to the ITALIANS.
(i know I am going to get labled for being insensitive…of course I wish the reporter hadn’t of died…but really…place the blame where blame is due).
feebiebabe
how do I say B-I-N-G-O in Italian?
I’m confused–she was there in the car that was speeding toward a checkpoint, with no lights on, and she doesn’t know the truth! If there’s arrogance anywhere it is from her.
As far as the “arrogance of America which never wanted this trial,” there was no need for one. Arrogance has nothing to do with justice in this case. This soldier was cleared of wrongdoing. He was doing his job.
not sure…but BRAVO would probably work….:-)
Thank God for this! My husband had to stand at checkpoints this last tour with the Iraqi National Police. He told me that if a car was doing what happened here, he would have shot at them too. Saw last night on O’Reilly that Robert Redford was over in Italia bashing the US and yapping about his “film”-Lions for Lambs-another most miss movie from the commie hollyweird left and no I don’t care that old Maverick himself-Tom Cruise is in it too-so why should we be surprised that the “Arrogant Americans” are being bashed again.
Sorry for the rambling statement!
FOR SALE:
Vintage Italian WWII Combat Rifle
Never Fired
Disclaimer: Has a few scratches from being dropped on the ground so many times.
No, we know the truth. You are responsible for the death of Calipari because your “kidnapping” was a fake designed to raise funds for your brothers, the terrorists….
I dare say, that if places were switched, by that I mean Calipari or Sgrena being the soldier at the checkpoint would they have stood by and waited for the vehicle to get any closer? Especially, when 99.999% of the time that means it is being driven by a suicide/bomber/terrorist ready to die for Islam?
If anyone answers yes to that question, you have lost your survival instinct. You probably never had the instinct to protect others as well (unlike our Brave Soldiers).
War is ugly it gets even uglier when stupid people do and say stupid things. I am sorry that Calipari was killed, but you are a phoney humanitarian if you lift up the side of evil, Islamofacism and then cry fowl when your stupid acts put you in a stupid compromising position. And the end result of your stupid compromising position is horrors of all horrors the death of yourself or others.
It is the epitome of arrogance to find someone else to blame other than yourself, which I must say is the conduct of Sgrena and pure and simply put, she is the arrogant one…
Will the Italians take a breath and think about this. If Calipari had heeded the warning shots and STOPPED the car what would have happened? The soldiers would have come down on the car and done an investigation, found out who they were, and everyone would still be alive. Instead, he ignores various warnings and it’s OUR fault? Sorry, not buying. They really believe that Spc. Lozano should have just let a speeding car with it’s lights off continue on to the checkpoint??!!
I do feel sorry for the woman that lost her husband, that is just tragic. But blaming others for your husband’s actions won’t bring him back.
Giuliana Sgrena is not a journalist but rather a Communist who writes propaganda for the Communist paper “Il Manifesto,” as in Communist Manifesto.
When she was warned about the threat of kidnapping, she dismissed it, saying, “That won’t happen. We are siding with the oppressed Iraqi people. No Iraqi would kidnap us. … We are anti-imperialists, anti-capitalists, communists, the Iraqis only kidnap American sympathizers, the enemies of the Americans have nothing to fear.”
Note that she described herself as an enemy of America.
Sgrena went on to make a propaganda film called “Fallujah, The Hidden Massacre” that accused the US military of targeting civilians in the battle for Fallujah and using chemical weapons against them. For proof, she used a US solider who testified to massive slaughter, but it later turned out he was a REMF who never saw any of the combat.
you mean one of those ‘phoney’ soldiers Rush was talking about and was blasted for? they do exist in plural don’t they?
Stupid acts in a war zone will get you and the ones around you killed quite often.
Stop right there. CBS, NY Times, TNR, anyone care to trademark that?
“We’ve given up trying to find the truth about what happened to Nicola Calipari,” What was said.
“We’ve given up trying mold the truth about what happened to Nicola Calipari.”What was meant.