Washington – The Army criminal investigation that attempts to cut through the fog of war shrouding the friendly-fire death of former football player Pat Tillman could end with a case before a military court or no action at all.
For the military and the Tillman family, the fifth formal probe into the shooting could put to rest unanswered questions about the Army Ranger’s death along a canyon road near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in April 2004.
“The prior reviews had a certain sense of coverups more than an honest, full-fledged review,” Dan Goure, a defense analyst at the research firm Lexington Institute, said Sunday. “It’s essentially to raise it a notch from a standard review to a now-criminal review. When you have people taking testimony under oath, it makes it harder to cover things.”
The Army first reported that enemy fire killed Tillman. Later, military officials acknowledged that he had been shot during a confused confrontation between his unit and other U.S. troops. The military’s handling of the case has angered the Tillman family.
Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, promised Tillman’s family Sunday that investigators will examine all the facts in the criminal investigation. The Defense Department’s inspector general determined it was an additional step that needed to be taken even though there is no evidence of criminal activity, Pace said.
A Pentagon official told The Associated Press on Saturday that a criminal investigation would focus on possible charges of negligent homicide. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the new investigation had not formally begun.
Investigators want to look into whether fire by friendly forces was “fire that should have been going on or was someone potentially firing a weapon when they should not have been,” Pace said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
The Army Criminal Investigation Command likely will prepare a report based on any available evidence in the incident in which Tillman was shot by fellow soldiers in what previous military reviews had concluded was an accident, said an Army official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the case is ongoing.
Tillman, 27, played football for the Arizona Cardinals but left the NFL to join the Army after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
He was killed April 22, 2004. The Army said at the time that the barrage of bullets came from enemy fire.
A report by the Army later found that troops with Tillman knew at the time that friendly fire had killed him.
Officers destroyed critical evidence and concealed the truth from Tillman’s brother, also an Army Ranger, who was nearby, the report found.
Tillman’s parents have been highly critical of the Army for its handling of questions about their son’s death.
