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Author Topic: Military drops 1993 torture and murder charges against former airborne soldier
Frustrated Mess
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posted 15 September 2008 02:51 PM      Profile for Frustrated Mess   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
The Canadian military has closed one of the darkest chapters in its history by dropping all charges against a former soldier accused of the torture and murder of a Somali teenager.

Clayton Matchee, 43, has a serious brain injury and will never be fit to stand trial for the 1993 crime, said Bruce MacGregor, deputy director of military prosecutions. "It's no longer in the public interest to proceed on these charges," MacGregor said Monday.



http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5hcWSxEukl8bjPS_RVZAvhKUdFzOQ

From: doom without the gloom | Registered: Feb 2005  |  IP: Logged
martin dufresne
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posted 15 September 2008 03:01 PM      Profile for martin dufresne   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Inside, the blind-folded teenager was shackled, his hands cuffed behind his back and a wooden baton placed under his arms. He had been brutally beaten, and a lit cigar was used to burn the soles of his feet.

News of the shocking killing tarnished Canada's reputation as a peacekeeper and, following a government inquiry, led to the disbanding of the airborne.

(...)

"But we've never had a true national accounting of what happened. It's something most Canadians are understandably ashamed of, but I don't think we really have an understanding of it."

Huebert said not putting Matchee on trial means the public loses another opportunity to learn about whether systemic problems in the military played a role and, most of all, why Matchee may have done such a horrific thing.

But Huebert said the military has recovered tremendously over the past decade, due to institutional reforms and increased funding. The behaviour of Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan has been stellar, he said.

"When's the last time you've even heard a sniff of any Canadian Forces personnel doing something wrong?"



Of course, the fact that the Canadian Forces have moved from a peacekeeping to a war-making role may explain why killing unrmed locals and having them tortured is no longer considered wrong.

From: "Words Matter" (Mackinnon) | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
Tommy_Paine
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posted 15 September 2008 03:39 PM      Profile for Tommy_Paine     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I wonder if the noose Matchee used to hang himself was ever kept in evidence? Not that my curiosity is usually this lurid, I just thought what a nice gift it would make for those fine gentlemen at CSIS and the RCMP who sent Arar off to be tortured in Syria.
From: The Alley, Behind Montgomery's Tavern | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
martin dufresne
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posted 15 September 2008 04:01 PM      Profile for martin dufresne   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Actually, it was never explained how Matchee was able to hang "himself", given that it is standard procedure to take belt and shoelaces away from prisoners before incarceration.

A more detailed perspective on Shidane Arone's killing:

quote:
On the night of 16 March 1993, Shidane Abukar Arone, a sixteen-year old Somali prisoner, was tortured and beaten to death by Master Corporal Clayton Matchee, with the active help of Corporal Kyle Brown; both men were serving with Number Two Commando of the Canadian Airborne Regiment Battle Group at Belet Huen, in Somalia. This crime would spark one of the most significant scandals that the Canadian forces had faced in its peacetime history.
Only two weeks before, two unarmed Somalis were engaged by a patrol from the Canadian Airborne when they attempted to flee, having been caught trying to break in to the compound; one was severely wounded, the other killed. These two incidents were the direct result of the Regiment’s approach to operations to deter looters and were later found to be the result of endemic poor discipline and a subversion of the strong airborne ethos. In the lead up to the murder of Arone, incursions by thieves in to the various United Nations compounds had reached epidemic proportions. Tensions were high at a time when, elsewhere in Somalia, UNITAF forces had been involved in twenty-two shootings in the first two weeks of March.
Captured looters were increasingly abused by soldiers within the Canadian contingent, as a deterrent. Trophy photographs were taken in which airborne soldiers posed with their captives, some of whom were tortured with wet rags. On the morning of 16 March, the OC of Number Two Commando, Major Anthony Seward, delivered his daily Orders group to his platoon leaders. Duringthese orders, he instructed Captain Michael Sox to deploy a snatch patrol that night to ‘capture a prisoner and make an example of him.’(6)
The soldiers of Sox’s platoon would take him at his word.
In subsequent investigations, it was found that racism, thuggery and anti-social behaviour were endemic within the Regiment and that members of Number Two Commando had direct links to various extreme right wing organisations. Offences for assault, drunk driving, drunkenness and weapons misuse were higher than anywhere else in the Canadian Army. This was not a recent problem. In 1986, Colonel Peter Kenward reported that the majority of his men were aggressive, keen, fit and working hard to meet the challenges of airborne soldiering. However, he also

(6): David Bercusson, Significant Incident, 1996

noted there was, ‘an element in the commando that had to be removed.’ These were men with the ‘Rambo attitude, who affected American-style dress, bad attitudes and a reverence for the Rebel flag.’ Efforts had been made to improve the situation but only small advances had been achieved. Much of this was due to weaknesses in the leadership structure of the Regiment, particularly at Junior Non-Commissioned Officer level. This leadership deficit was not aided by careerist and cynical attitudes being displayed by some members of the Officers’ Mess, who were prepared to avoid confrontation in order to achieve an easier life.
Despite concerns over the Regiments overall discipline, no recent operational experience and a poor report from pre-operational training, it was decided to deploy the Canadian Airborne Regiment to Somalia. As a result of the actions of individuals during this tour, the Regiment was ultimately disbanded.


(From A Platoon Commander's perspective, pages 45-47)

From: "Words Matter" (Mackinnon) | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
Jingles
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posted 15 September 2008 07:05 PM      Profile for Jingles     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
A valuable lesson for any member of the Canadian forces who is not an officer. If something happens, the officer corps will protect themselves and (literally, in this case) hang you out to dry.

Matchee is a thug and criminal, but at least he had the decency to try and off himself. Not one officer involved had the cojones to even symbolically fall on his sword.

The lowest ranking member involved, and the one who blew the whistle, was the one who paid the price.


From: At the Delta of the Alpha and the Omega | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged
skarredmunkey
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posted 15 September 2008 08:20 PM      Profile for skarredmunkey     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Jingles:
A valuable lesson for any member of the Canadian forces who is not an officer. If something happens, the officer corps will protect themselves and (literally, in this case) hang you out to dry.

Matchee is a thug and criminal, but at least he had the decency to try and off himself. Not one officer involved had the cojones to even symbolically fall on his sword.

The lowest ranking member involved, and the one who blew the whistle, was the one who paid the price.


I'm sorry for being a complete dittohead about the Somalia Affair, but is the consensus here that Matchee likely did NOT attempt suicide?


From: Vancouver Centre | Registered: Nov 2005  |  IP: Logged
Albireo
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posted 15 September 2008 08:43 PM      Profile for Albireo     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I don't think that's right. From footage, Matchee appears to have suffered massive brain damage from his attempted hanging. I can't imagine it's just an Oscar-caliber performance. "Not fit to stand trial" rings true to me; it would be like convicting and jailing a toddler.

This is a sad story all around, for this poor misguided scumbag and his family, and most especially for the original Somali victim and his family.


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Malcolm
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posted 15 September 2008 08:49 PM      Profile for Malcolm   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
That seems to be the consensus of some folk here. It seems more than speculative here. Positively "grassy knoll."

Given the circumstances, dropping the charges was the only course of action that made any sense. Continuing them would be a wasted effort and an added and unnecessary stress on MCpl Matchee's family.

I know that many CF pers were appalled by this affair from start to finish, right from the initial decision to deploy a unit with such severe and deep rooted disciplinary problems down to the scapegoating of Kyle Brown.

Although the Liberals cut short the inquiry, their final report is still a damning endictment of failed leadership at the most senior levels.


From: Regina, SK | Registered: Mar 2004  |  IP: Logged
Harumph
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posted 27 September 2008 12:01 AM      Profile for Harumph     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Jingles:
A valuable lesson for any member of the Canadian forces who is not an officer. If something happens, the officer corps will protect themselves and (literally, in this case) hang you out to dry.

Matchee is a thug and criminal, but at least he had the decency to try and off himself. Not one officer involved had the cojones to even symbolically fall on his sword.

The lowest ranking member involved, and the one who blew the whistle, was the one who paid the price.


As an officer, I've seen no evidence of that. Some officers are that way, as are some NCOs. The officers, if anything, "eat their own" as they should.

Who is held responsible generally depends on what act was committed, in what context, etc. If a troop goes AWOL over the weekend, one can hardly hold his commander, be it an officer or NCO, responsible. However, if in fact the platoon commander in Somalia issued the order to "make an example" of a prisoner, he should absolutely be held responsible and he should have stated as much as soon as he found out what had occurred.

Whether he did that and it was discounted by his superiors, I don't know. I can't imagine not taking responsibility for actions stemming directly from my own orders. That's where a principle called "unlimited liability" comes into play. If you issue an order and it's A) illegal, or B) misunderstood, then you're criminally liable or you weren't clear in your direction (respectively). Either way, it's your fault.

[ 27 September 2008: Message edited by: Harumph ]


From: West of Ottawa | Registered: Apr 2008  |  IP: Logged
martin dufresne
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posted 27 September 2008 12:12 AM      Profile for martin dufresne   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Who is held responsible generally depends on what act was committed, in what context, etc.
AND who lived to tell about it.

From: "Words Matter" (Mackinnon) | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
Tommy_Paine
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posted 27 September 2008 08:25 AM      Profile for Tommy_Paine     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I don't buy into the conspiracy theory, mostly because it wasn't necessary. Even if Matchee was "silenced" because he was going to blow the whistle on officers, the Canadian government or agents there of have no need to be so crass as to murder someone. Just simply get the Crown Attourney to make a "misstake" and get the charges dismissed. Or, just ignore them altogether.

That's the Canadian way.

And, as it turns out, we all found out everything anyway.

So, I see Matchee more sympathetically than some. We're all older than Matchee was at the time, perhaps with more sophisticated life experiences that enable us to take for granted that we could extricate ourselves from a situation Matchee-- not the ring leader from all accounts-- not only couldn't extract himself from, but found himself not strong enough in the situation that his conscience, or true character, told him was gravely wrong.

And, he couldn't live with himself in the end, according to my view. I give Matchee a good helping of benifit of the doubt. Because if you remember some of the background of the Airborne leading up to the Somalia torture, I at least can see a dynamic where such a scenario could play out.


My sardonic post above points to the fact that we have officials in CSIS and the RCMP connected to the torture of Arar who certainly cannot make any deffense of moral weakness in a bad dynamic.

Thugs. Criminals. And in the end, of much less character than Matchee.

And we suffer them to walk amoung us.


From: The Alley, Behind Montgomery's Tavern | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
Harumph
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posted 28 September 2008 11:22 AM      Profile for Harumph     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by martin dufresne:
AND who lived to tell about it.

The conspiracy nonsense is ridiculous. Matchee tried to hang himself because he was a miserable, lowly twit that couldn't handle the shame and pressure of his situation.

People really have no understanding of how things work in the military. If they did, they'd realise how utterly ridiculous it is to think a "conspiracy" was hatched to protect "The Officers", none of which ranked higher than LCol which is about as high on the totem pole as middle-management in the grand scheme of things.


From: West of Ottawa | Registered: Apr 2008  |  IP: Logged
Prometheus30
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posted 12 October 2008 06:52 AM      Profile for Prometheus30     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Or why the bootlaces he hung himself were from American issued boots and not his own Canadian ones, DUM DUM DUMMMMM
From: ottawa | Registered: Oct 2008  |  IP: Logged
martin dufresne
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posted 12 October 2008 11:31 AM      Profile for martin dufresne   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
If I had given orders to "set an example" in order to intimidate hungry Somalians hitting on the Canadian camps supplies - a superior officer did according to an independent account -, I would definitely be very interested, indeed compelled to silence someone who had botched the job as badly as Cayton Matchee had. There had been other murders by Canadian soldiers in Somalia in the preceding days but none involving lengthy torture and grinning pictures of the murderer with his prey. Definitely a huge mess for the West's image (and enormous interests in this region), calling for swift and secret damage control.
From: "Words Matter" (Mackinnon) | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
Prometheus30
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posted 13 October 2008 08:08 AM      Profile for Prometheus30     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
but none involving lengthy torture and grinning pictures of the murderer with his prey.

That you know of!
Those guys were just insane!

From: ottawa | Registered: Oct 2008  |  IP: Logged

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