Fort Hood, Texas – An Army staff sergeant from Fort Carson was acquitted of murder Thursday in the death of an unarmed Iraqi he said he shot to save a fellow soldier.
A jury of four soldiers and two officers deliberated for less than three hours before finding Staff Sgt. Shane Werst not guilty of premeditated murder. He had faced a maximum of life in prison without parole.
Before the jury announced the verdict, the judge found Werst not guilty of obstruction of justice, so the jury’s verdict on that charge was not revealed. Col. Theodore Dixon said he decided to rule on that charge.
Werst’s family shrieked, cried and hugged after the verdict was read.
“Soldiers have to be able to know that they’re not being second-guessed in the battlefield and in close-quarters combat,” defense attorney David Sheldon said.
Prosecutors said the killing of Naser Ismail, a suspected insurgent, was in retaliation for an Army captain’s death earlier that day. Werst, 32, said he shot Ismail only because he was lunging for an unsuspecting soldier’s weapon during house raids in Iraq.
Werst testified Thursday that he doesn’t regret killing Ismail but admitted his actions afterward in making the slaying look like self-defense were wrong.
“I would still to this day fire on that man, sir,” said Werst.
Werst said he and a fellow soldier went into a house with Ismail because he thought the Iraqi would turn over more weapons. Werst earlier found and confiscated a pistol in Ismail’s house.
After shooting Ismail, Werst said he quickly fired the Iraqi pistol into a couch and told the other soldier, Pfc. Nathan Stewart, to put the man’s fingerprints on it.
“It was wrong. I have no idea why I did that,” Werst said.
Werst, of El Toro, Calif., was a combat engineer in the 3rd Brigade Combat Team at Fort Carson, near Colorado Springs.
