A British court has dismissed charges against five British soldiers accused of mistreating Iraqi civilian detainees.
The nine Iraqi detainees allegedly were handcuffed, hooded, beaten, held in stress positions and deprived of sleep for about two days in extreme heat at a British army barracks near the southern Iraqi city of Basra in September 2003.
The court was told that Iraqi Baha Mousa, a 26-year-old hotel worker, died after Payne applied pressure on the detainee's back.
The eight other Iraqi detainees were released without charge.
Justice Stuart McKinnon ruled that two other charges against Payne - manslaughter and perverting the course of justice - should be dismissed, along with the charge of inhumanely treating detainees against two of Payne's co-defendants: Lance Cpl. Wayne Ashley Crowcroft, 22, and Pvt. Darren Trevor Fallon, 23.
The judge also dismissed a common assault charge against Sgt. Kelvin Lee Stacey, 29, and a charge of negligently performing duties against Col. Jorge Emmanuel Mendonca, 42.
McKinnon said the court-martial at the Bulford Camp army base, 135 kilometers southwest of London, would continue against Warrant Officer Mark Lester Davies, 37, and Maj. Michael Edwin Peebles, 35, on the charge of negligently performing their duties.
The judge delivered his ruling yesterday after the prosecution rested its case and the defence said the charges against their clients should be dismissed or reduced for lack of evidence.
However McKinnon ordered the verdict not be reported until he read it to a military board of military officers acting as a jury today.
Iraqi Ahmad Taha Musa al-Matairi, the only detainee to testify at the court-martial, said the defendants laughed as they beat one of the detainees in a sweltering detention facility and took bets on which soldier could knock him down first.
Al-Matairi testified that he was detained because he was part-owner of the hotel suspected of being an insurgent base. Soldiers allegedly found rifles, ammunition, grenades and timers as well as forged identity documents and money.
AP