Abu Ghraib dog handler convicted of tormenting prisoners

FORT MEADE, Md. -- An Army dog handler at Abu Ghraib was convicted Tuesday of tormenting prisoners with his snarling animal and competing with a comrade to make the Iraqis soil themselves.\nSgt. Michael J. Smith, 24, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., was found guilty of six of 13 counts at a court-martial. The judge later dismissed one of those six counts, saying it duplicated another.\nA sentencing hearing began in the afternoon. The five charges carried up to 8 1/2 years behind bars.\nProsecutors said Smith let his unmuzzled black Belgian shepherd bark and lunge at several prisoners for his own amusement. One of the photographs that led to the exposure of the scandal at the Iraqi prison shows his dog straining on its leash, just inches from the face of a cowering prisoner.\nSmith had faced the stiffest potential sentence of any soldier charged so far in the Abu Ghraib scandal -- 24 1/2 years in prison.\nThe defense maintained that Smith was a good soldier who believed he was doing what the government wanted canine handlers to do at Abu Ghraib: provide security and frighten interrogation subjects. Also, defense attorney Capt. Mary G. McCarthy said all that Smith's dog did to prisoners was bark at them.\nThe defense further argued that Abu Ghraib was a dangerous, chaotic place where policies were so murky that even the general who supervised interrogations testified he was confused.\nThe jury deliberated for about 18 hours over three days. The soldier, wearing his green dress uniform, stood at attention, staring straight ahead, as the verdict was read.\nSmith was found guilty of maltreatment involving three prisoners, conspiring with another dog handler in a contest to make detainees soil themselves, dereliction of duty, assault and an indecent act. The assault charge was dismissed.\nThe indecency conviction was for directing his dog to lick peanut butter off the genitals of a male soldier and the breasts of a female soldier.\nThe other dog handler, Sgt. Santos A. Cardona, 31, of Fullerton, Calif., is set for trial May 22.\nNine other soldiers have been convicted of abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib, in many cases by putting them in sexually humiliating poses and photographing them. Former Cpl. Charles Graner Jr. received the longest sentence -- 10 years in prison. Lynndie England, a 23-year-old reservist photographed giving a thumbs-up in front of naked prisoners, is serving three years behind bars.\nDuring the prosecution's closing argument at Smith's trial, the jury was shown enlarged photographs from 2003 and 2004 of Smith's dog menacing cowering detainees in cellblock hallways.\n"Look at the fear in his eyes," prosecutor Maj. Christopher Graveline said of one prisoner. "This is not to gain compliance."\nSgt. John H. Ketzer, an interrogator at the prison, testified that one night, he followed the sounds of screaming to a cell where Smith's dog was straining against its leash and barking at two cowering teenage boys.\nKetzer said Smith laughingly told him afterward: "My buddy and I are having a contest to see if we can get them to (defecate on) themselves because we've already had some (urinate on) themselves."\nUnder cross-examination, Ketzer said he thought Smith was only joking about the contest.\nProsecutors told the jury that Smith had violated two tenets of his training: treat prisoners humanely and use the minimum amount of force needed to ensure compliance.