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FORT HOOD, Texas A military jury of Iraq war veterans convicted Army Spc. Charles A. Graner Jr. Friday of charges that he assaulted and humiliated Iraqi prisoners in late 2003 at Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. The abuse, documented in graphic photographs taken by soldiers, caused an international uproar and cost the United States credibility in the Arab world. The jury of 10 men four officers and six senior enlisted sergeants deliberated more than five hours Friday before announcing the guilty verdicts to a tense courtroom at Fort Hood. Graner, who was deemed ringleader of the abuse, stood at attention and did not react. The trial, which began Monday, came one year to the month after another soldier in Graner's military police company prompted a criminal investigation by turning over copies of photographs to Army investigators in Baghdad. The abuses occurred in autumn 2003. The jury found Graner guilty of charges of conspiracy, maltreatment of detainees, dereliction of duty, aggravated assault and assault. The jury reduced one aggravated assault charge to assault, which reduced the possible maximum sentence to 15 years in military prison. Prosecutors, in their closing argument, appealed to the jurors' regard for the Army and its standards, referring to the taint that the Abu Ghraib scandal brought on the Army and the U.S. government. "He does not get to dictate how the U.S. Army is viewed," Capt. Chris Graveline said. Pointing at the photograph of Graner giving a thumbs up behind a pyramid of naked prisoners, Graveline said, "This cannot become a recruitment poster for the U.S. Army." The case against Graner, 36, a reservist in the Maryland-based 372nd Military Police Company and a prison guard in Pennsylvania, immediately moved into the sentencing phase. Houston attorney Guy Womack, a civilian attorney representing Graner, renewed his attack on the government's case, saying that the government is pinning blame for what happened at Abu Ghraib on a low-ranking specialist who, he said, only followed the directions and orders of interrogators who worked in Graner's wing of the prison. "The U.S. government and the MIs and chain of command said, 'We didn't know anything about that'?" Womack said of the abuse, referring to military intelligence officers. "That is a lie. "Now the government is wanting a corporal, an E-4, to take the hit for it." Graner was nothing more than "a tool and implement" of military and civilian interrogators, who in fall 2003 were under pressure to gain intelligence about Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's whereabouts and the escalating severity of attacks against U.S. troops, Womack said. Although some of the tactics of humiliation and the threats used by intelligence soldiers and MPs might be "offensive" on a "sunny, clear day in Killeen, Texas," the home of Fort Hood, they were reasonable measures against insurgents and criminals in a war zone, he argued. "It was the way things were done in Tier 1 Alpha," Womack said. "We don't have to like it. We don't have to do it." Graveline said there was no evidence that anyone ordered him to do the things he was charged with. None of the prisoners in the pyramid, masturbation or leash incidents had any intelligence value to the government, he said, and all of the prisoners were defenseless, compliant and posed no danger to MPs at the time. Graner, Graveline continued, is a "smart person" who instigated the abuse and torture and led other soldiers to join in because he was bored and sexually depraved. "What we have here is plain abuse," he said. "There is no doubt. There is no justification. "It's for sport. It's for laughs. The only thing he can say after he knocks a man out is 'Damn, that hurt.' " Womack downplayed the incidents in the photos, calling the human pyramid an "ingenious" way of controlling prisoners, the use of a leash around the neck of a prisoner a safe "cell extraction," and the gleeful photographic evidence "gallows humor" in a stressful environment. He said the photos were commonly known and seen by soldiers who worked in the prison. Testimony on Thursday indicated that Lt. Col. Steve Jordan, the highest-ranking military intelligence officer in the prison, viewed at least some of the photos weeks before Army criminal investigators learned of their existence. Joseph Darby, a soldier in the company, turned them over to Army investigators on Jan. 13, 2004, after Graner handed him copies, proof that Graner didn't think he did anything wrong, Womack said. "Would you give them to somebody you don't even know if it was something you could be court-martialed for?" he said. Graveline emotionally asked how jurors would feel if an 18-year-old service member was at the end of that leash. "If this was happening to one of our soldiers, there would be no question it was abuse," Graveline said. What's Next:
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