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Thursday, Jul 9, 2009
Col. Sean MacFarland, who told Jean Feggins her son was killed by enemy action, is the same officer who may have covered up her son's death by friendly fire.
Editor's note: See Rep. Dean Heller's letter requesting a new friendly-fire investigation here.
By Mark Benjamin
Read more: Politics, News, Army, Iraq War, Friendly Fire, Mark Benjamin
Jean Feggins, the mother of Pfc. Albert Nelson
Dec. 4, 2008 | On Dec. 4, 2006, U.S. Army Pfc. Albert Nelson was killed in Ramadi, Iraq, in an apparent friendly-fire incident. As first described in Salon, interviews with soldiers and a graphic battle video seem to indicate that a U.S. tank shell hit the roof of the building where Nelson was positioned, taking off his left leg. He suffered for half an hour before dying on the way to a military hospital. A subsequent Army investigation, however, blamed Nelson's death on enemy action.
Nelson's mother was not satisfied by the Army's official statement. Jean Feggins had heard that her son's death might have been caused by friendly fire, and she started a letter-writing campaign, demanding more information.
In early 2007, Feggins finally received an in-person briefing, complete with PowerPoint slides, from a high-ranking officer. The officer gave her the official Army version of her son's death, saying he'd been killed by enemy mortars -- a version of events contradicted by the video obtained by Salon. He also assured her that Nelson had died instantly and had not suffered. "When we found him on the roof, he was still in his position," the officer said, "holding his weapon."
Salon has now learned that the Army officer who visited Feggins was Col. Sean MacFarland -- the same officer who conducted the investigation that exonerated the Army. The news comes just as the Associated Press is reporting that the father of the other Army soldier killed in the same incident is demanding answers of his own. Roger Suarez of Carson City, Nev., is asking that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates conduct a new investigation into the circumstances of Pfc. Roger Suarez-Gonzalez's death. His death, like Nelson's, was officially attributed to enemy action.
This fall, nearly two years after Nelson's death, I sat with Feggins on a brown sofa in a small den in the living room of her West Philadelphia home. I had just returned from Fort Carson, Colo., interviewing soldiers who said they watched Nelson and Suarez die when a hail of friendly fire from an American tank blasted their position on the roof.
I held in my hands a DVD recording of the incident in Ramadi, captured by a sergeant's helmet-mounted camera. The video shows the chaotic scene and includes soldiers claiming to have watched the tank fire at the men. The tank shell screamed in from the west, soldiers say, all but obliterating Suarez, sending his head and torso far off the roof to the east.
Feggins' son wasn't so lucky. The tape shows him regaining consciousness and suffering terribly as his buddies struggle to stem his bleeding and keep him calm.
Until I knocked on her door, Feggins had had no idea the tape even existed, but she wanted to see it. "I need to know everything," she told me. "You think I can't handle that? I can handle that. That was my child."
Salon published the article on Oct. 14 along with a copy of the video, with Nelson's image obscured at Feggins' request. The video is painful, Feggins said, but knowing the truth meant a "great weight" had been lifted from her. She wanted the story to be told.
The tape, just over 52 minutes long, shows the men of 2nd Platoon, D Company, 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division hunkered down in a building on the south shore of the Euphrates River in Ramadi. The men are heard and seen pointing to a nearby U.S. tank. After an explosion, the building shakes, and Sgt. Jack Robison, who is wearing the helmet camera, runs upstairs to check on casualties. He finds Nelson on the second floor, missing his leg, being attended by medics. A later search reveals that Suarez has been blown off the roof and killed by the apparent tank shell impact. As the men in the building wait for medical help, several of them refer to being fired on by an American tank.
Although I was able to find Jean Feggins, I was unable to establish contact with Suarez's father, Roger Suarez, before publication of the initial Salon story. But Suarez found his congressman soon after the story appeared. On Monday of this week, Nevada Republican Rep. Dean Heller wrote Defense Secretary Robert Gates, requesting a new investigation into the incident. "Recently video and audio recordings of this incident in Ramadi have been reported by online news services," Heller wrote. "The evidence included in these accounts poses serious questions about how Pfc. Suarez-Gonzalez was killed, and also raises the question as to whether friendly fire may have been involved."
New friendly fire coverup: Army shreds files on dead soldiers
Friendly fire in Iraq -- and a coverup
Video: Friendly fire attack in Iraq 
The Army's version of the deaths of Nelson and Suarez
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