BAGHDAD (AFP) — An American soldier failed on Sunday in a bid to replace the judge at a pre-trial hearing into charges that he murdered an Iraqi detainee, a US spokeswoman said.
First Lieutenant Michael Behenna, 25, is accused of the premeditated murder of Ali Mansur Mohammed, as well as assault, making a false official statement and obstruction of justice.
The hearing, at a US military base near Tikrit, the hometown of executed dictator Saddam Hussein, was interrupted minutes after it began, US military spokeswoman Major Peggy Kageleiry told AFP.
"The defence put forth a motion first thing this morning to have the investigating officer replaced," she said, referring to the presiding military judge at the hearing.
The judge was not replaced and proceedings subsequently resumed, she said, adding that the pre-trial hearing is expected to end on Wednesday.
Behenna has been charged along with Staff Sergeant Hal Warner, 34, whose hearings were completed last week, after which military prosecutors called for him to face a court martial.
According to the charges against the two men, Mohammed was first shot dead on May 16 and then his face was badly burnt by an incendiary grenade.
The murder took place under a bridge in the northern oil refinery town of Baiji, after the two soldiers left their base with Mohammed to set him free at a checkpoint, according to the charges.
Mohammed was initially believed to have been freed along with another detainee, but his naked and badly burnt body was found under the bridge the next day.
A key witness at Warner's hearing, an Iraqi translator, accused Behenna of killing the detainee after a roadside bombing in April killed four people, including two American soldiers.
The US military in Iraq has been rocked by a series of scandals.
The most serious charges of unlawful killings came when a group of marines was accused of murdering 24 Iraqi civilians in the town of Haditha in November 2005 after a roadside bomb killed a comrade.
Eight marines were charged the following year, but most were either acquitted or had the charges withdrawn before court martial.
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