Sergeant to plead to killing Afghan villagers

SEATTLE -- The Army staff sergeant charged with slaughtering 16 villagers last year during one of the worst atrocities of the Afghanistan War has agreed to plead guilty in a deal to avoid the death penalty, his attorney said yesterday.

Staff Sgt. Robert Bales is scheduled to enter guilty pleas to charges of premeditated murder next Wednesday at Joint Base Lewis-McChord south of Seattle, said lawyer John Henry Browne.

A sentencing-phase trial set for September will determine whether he is sentenced to life in prison with or without the possibility of parole. The judge and the commanding general at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, where Bales is being held, must approve a plea deal.

"The deal that has been worked out . . . is they take the death penalty off the table, and he pleads as charged, pretty much," Browne said. An army spokesman, Maj. Gary Dangerfield, confirmed that a plea hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, but said he could not immediately provide other details.

Browne previously indicated Bales remembered little from the night of the massacre. But as further details and records emerged, Bales began to remember what he did, the lawyer said, and he will admit to "very specific facts" about the shootings.

Bales is contrite about the killings, Browne said. The attorney would not elaborate on what his client will tell the judge. He described Bales as "crazed" and "broken" the night of the attack.

The defense team, including military lawyers assigned to Bales as well as Browne's co-counsel, eventually determined after having Bales examined by psychiatrists that he would not be able to prove any claim of insanity or diminished capacity at the time of the attack, Browne said.

Bales, an Ohio native and father of two from Lake Tapps, Wash., slipped away from his remote southern Afghanistan outpost at Camp Belambay early on March 11, 2012, and attacked mud-walled compounds in two slumbering villages. He had been drinking contraband alcohol, snorting Valium and taking steroids.

Most of the victims were women and children, and some of the bodies were piled and burned. The slayings drew such angry protests that the United States temporarily halted combat operations in Afghanistan.