Three-judge panel issues split opinion and orders new trial for Nicholas Slatten, saying previous decision erred in not allowing him individual trial

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

A federal appeals court has overturned the first-degree murder conviction of a former Blackwater security contractor and ordered a new trial for the man who prosecutors said fired the first shots in the 2007 killing of 14 Iraqi civilians at a crowded traffic circle in Baghdad.

Former Blackwater guards sentenced for massacre of unarmed Iraqi civilians Read more

In a split opinion issued on Friday, the three-judge panel of the US court of appeals for the DC circuit ruled that a court erred in 2014 by not allowing Nicholas Slatten to be tried separately from his co-defendants, Paul Slough, Evan Liberty and Dustin Heard.

Slatten, a 33-year-old contractor from Tennessee who was the sniper on a team protecting state department officials, is serving a life sentence. During his trial, prosecutors said he saw killing Iraqis as “payback for 9/11”. No connection between Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi regime and the 9/11 attacks has been proven.

The Washington appeals panel also ordered new sentences for Slough, Liberty and Heard, who were found guilty of 13 charges of voluntary manslaughter and 17 charges of attempted manslaughter and sentenced to 30 years each.

The judges determined those sentences violated the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment because prosecutors charged them with using military firearms while committing another felony. That statute, typically employed against gang members or bank robbers, had never been used against overseas security contractors working for the US government.

The lawyers for the defendants could not immediately be reached for comment.

Fourteen people died and at least 17 were wounded in the incident in Nisour Square in Baghdad, which strained international relations and drew scrutiny of the role of American contractors in the Iraq war.

The government described the killings as a one-sided ambush of unarmed civilians, while the defense said the guards had opened fire only after a white Kia sedan seen as a potential car bomb began moving quickly toward their convoy. After the shooting stopped, no evidence of a bomb was found.

In issuing their ruling benefiting the defendants, the judges said they were in no way excusing the horror of events they said “def[y] civilized description”.

“In reaching this conclusion, we by no means intend to minimize the carnage attributable to Slough, Heard and Liberty’s actions,” said the US circuit Judge Karen L Henderson, writing for the court. “Their poor judgments resulted in the deaths of many innocent people.”

In a sentencing memorandum filed in April 2015, the government said: “None of the victims was an insurgent, or posed any threat to the Raven 23 convoy.”



In the same memorandum, David Boslego, a retired US army colonel, called the massacre “a grossly excessive use of force … grossly inappropriate for an entity whose only job was to provide personal protection to somebody in an armored vehicle”.

Blackwater, which is based in North Carolina, is now known as Academi, having previously been sold and renamed as Xe Services. Its founder, Erik Prince, is the brother of the current US education secretary, Betsy DeVos. He is no longer attached to the company.