Loading summary
Transcript133 lines
- [00:01]
Madeline Barron
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it@progressive.com, progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states. Previously on in the Dark.
- [00:28]
Samara Freemark
I remember I opened a Humvee and.
- [00:30]
Madeline Barron
I just see bodies stacked up. And I open another one, same thing.
- [00:34]
Samara Freemark
I'm like, shit. What he noticed was gunshots. Most of them. A gunshot in the head or in the chest.
- [00:47]
Madeline Barron
Shots, yes.
- [00:49]
Samara Freemark
They died this way.
- [00:51]
Madeline Barron
They have different values than we do. Okay. They're more concerned about the living than those that have passed. They did not get the pictures. Those pictures today have still not been seen. After the Marines shot the people by the white car and went inside Safa's house and Abdul Rahman's house and killed nearly everyone inside, they took a break and regrouped. Some of the Marines walked over to a nearby empty house and went up to the rooftop. They were up there for a while smoking cigarettes, and then they said they saw something suspicious in the courtyard down below. Exactly what that suspicious thing was is unclear. One Marine told investigators there was gunfire coming from a house down there. The others just described a man or men moving around outside near a house. Whatever it was got the Marines attention. And so three Marines, the squad leader, Sergeant Frank Wuderich, his right hand man, Corporal Hector Salinas, and the squad's gunner, Lance Corporal Justin Sharratt, the one who sometimes wore the patch that said Punisher, all came down off the roof and went to the house to check it out. What these Marines did next is highly disputed. I spent years at this point reading and re reading their statements, thinking through what they claimed happened. Unlike the Marines, vague stories of what happened inside the other houses. Their accounts of what went down inside this final house are incredibly specific, full of detail, and they provide a clear picture of what the Marines said happened. So clear you can see it all unfolding, almost like a movie. It goes like this. Wouterich, Sherritt and Salinas went down to that courtyard and went inside a house. There they found women and children inside. The Marines asked where the men were and according to the statements of two of the Marines, the women pointed to the house next door. Widerch and Sharratt went over to that house to investigate. They went inside and suddenly they found themselves face to face with a man holding an AK47 and pointing it right at them. Sharritt didn't hesitate, he aimed his machine gun at the man and tried to shoot, but his gun jammed. So Sharratt pulled out another weapon, a 9 millimeter pistol he'd borrowed earlier that day from the squad's medic, Brian Witt. Sherritt aimed the pistol at the man and shot him in the head. The fight wasn't over. Sherritt noticed another man, also armed with an ak, so Sherritt shot that man, too. Then Sherritt saw two more men in a corner moving toward their fallen comrades. Sherritt didn't want to take any chances. He thought the men might try to grab the AKs on the ground, so Sharratt shot them, too. Sharratt told investigators that he shot until he ran out of ammo, and he said that Wouterich then entered the room and shot the men who were already lying on the ground. For the record, Wouterich, in his only statement to investigators, only describes Sherrit's shooting. He doesn't mention whether he shot or not. After all, the shooting was over. Four men were lying dead in the room. Each one of them had been shot in the head. The Marines ran out. The whole thing lasted less than three minutes. By some miracle, the insurgents hadn't managed to get off a single shot. Later that evening, Sherritt found Brian Witt and returned the 9 millimeter. He had made a comment when he come back, saying something about he had popped his cherry and that was it. He said, I popped your 9 mils cherry. What did you think when he said that? What did I think? I assumed it meant that he had fucking shot someone with it. Sheriff boasted to other guys about what happened inside that house. He told them how, facing down the barrel of an AK47 as his own weapon jammed, he whipped out that 9 millimeter and shot all the men dead. He told one Marine, we killed them, quote, Punisher style. Another Marine said, the way Sherrit described what happened, it sounded like Sharrott had, quote, John Wayne D it. Even months later, when Sherritt was being interviewed by investigators, he bragged to them about all this. Our reporter Parker talked to one of the investigators, a man named Clyde Legault. He was very proud of what he did. At least that was the impression I got from him. What gave you that impression? You know, his back was straight. He sat up. He sat up straight. He spoke clearly. He was, you know, kind of forceful about what he did. Very, very like. Yep, this is what it did. At first glance, the story seems straightforward. The Marines had killed four men, men who the Marines claimed were all insurgents, men who appeared to have been trying to lure them to the house to ambush them. Nothing wrong with killing men like that. Shooting insurgents who are trying to kill you is not only justifiable, it was literally the reason the Marines had been sent to Iraq to defeat the enemy. What happened in that final house was the sort of thing you get awards for, not punishment. But as I read and re read these statements, I had some questions. For one thing, if there were four insurgents in that room waiting to ambush Marines, why did they only have two guns? Why didn't they come fully armed? I looked at a layout of the house, and the room where the insurgents supposedly were hiding out was the smallest room in the house. It only had one door. Seemed like a risky strategy for all four of them to hole up in there instead of spreading out tactically. And how was it possible that the insurgents weren't able to get a single shot off? The investigator Clyde Legault, also wondered about that when we asked, you know, well, what were the four men doing? Because, you know, it's like you had time to unsling a weapon that jammed, put it down, rack your nine, and those men just stood there, including the one that had the AK in the first place, and then you shot them all. You know, like, holy crap. That's. That's all I could think was, you know, holy crap. And a last question. Why were all these men shot in the head? It seems like if someone is pointing a gun at you and you have one shot max before they kill you, it's incredibly risky to aim for their head. Like, what if they're moving? What if you miss? That's why people are trained to aim for the chest. Brian Witt, the squad medic, also found this odd, because I always remember it being surreal that he did that. You know, I was like, there's no way, man. Not in that kind of situation. Cause it's hard, man. Aiming with a pistol is very hard. And plus, someone like Sharrott would know also to shoot for center mass, not the head, with a pistol. I just always thought the whole thing was, like, fishy. This is season three of in the Dark, an investigative podcast from the New Yorker. This season is about the killing of 24 men, women and children by US Marines in Haditha, Iraq. It's a story not just about the killings themselves, but also about the failure of the US Military to bring the men responsible for them to justice. In this episode, we investigate what really happened at that final house. Episode 5, Four Brothers if we get stuck in this elevator. I'm going to record it all. While I was in Erbil with our producer Samara, we went one day to meet with two women. Hello, my name is Madeline. I'm Samara. Nice to meet you. Their names are Najla Abdul Razak Hamid and Ehab Ayed. Turkey. Ehab. Ehab. So nice to meet you. Najla and Ehab had traveled from Haditha to Erbil to talk to us about what they'd witnessed on the day of the killings. Yeah. Please sit down. We met up at the hotel where they were staying. It was called the Classy Hotel. We all sat down on couches in their room with our interpreter, Aya. We wanted to start just by saying that we know it's not easy to talk about, and so we're really grateful to you for talking with us. This is ihap.
- [09:47]
Samara Freemark
She said that she's doing this interview. It's because so many people need to know the truth about what happened, to know their story and to know what they saw at that day.
- [10:04]
Madeline Barron
Ehab is now 40. Najla is 54. It was clear that the two women are close. They sat right next to each other. Sometimes they even finished each other's sentences. We spent a long time talking about what happened on November 19, 2005. But first, Ehab and Najla told us what their lives had been like before that day. Najla grew up in Baghdad. She told us how she met Jamal, the man she would eventually marry. Jamal was from Hadithah. He was a member of the Iraqi military, and he served with Najla's brother. One day, her brother brought Jamal home for a visit.
- [10:43]
Samara Freemark
He visited their house, and he saw her just for a glance. And he just asked her parents for her to marry him.
- [10:52]
Madeline Barron
Wow. After just seeing you, after just for.
- [10:54]
Samara Freemark
A glance, you know he was in love.
- [10:59]
Madeline Barron
As soon as Najela started talking about her husband, her whole face brightened. She smiled and blushed. What did he look like?
- [11:13]
Samara Freemark
He was handsome. She says he was handsome. Their relationship was so strong, and they were like friends, not only a man and a wife.
- [11:37]
Madeline Barron
When they got married, Najal and Jamal moved to Haditha, into the house right next door to Jamal's parents. There was a wall between the houses, but the family tore it down so they could share the courtyard and go back and forth more easily. Najla quickly got to know Jamal's younger brothers. Their names were Jasib, Marwan and Katan. And what were your husband's brothers? Like.
- [12:03]
Samara Freemark
She says, like, she raised them. She basically raised Them because when she moved into Hadithah, they were just kids. So they grew up with her and they call her like our second mom.
- [12:19]
Madeline Barron
In 1991, Najla and Jamal had their first and only child, a boy. They named him Khalid. Khalid Jamal's an adult now. He's 32. And he also came to Erbil to talk to us.
- [12:37]
Samara Freemark
He's thanking you for flying all the way from the US to just talk about his story with him.
- [12:44]
Madeline Barron
For years growing up, Khalil Jamal was the only kid in his family. He would go back and forth from his house to his relative's house next door. The way he described it was like every kid's dream. Surrounded by loving parents, loving aunts and uncles, grandparents. And as the only child, Khalid Jamal had all the attention in the world.
- [13:10]
Samara Freemark
Their house was so big, and he was the only child living in this house. He had his freedom in that house. And he was like having fun. And sometimes he was even changing his place of sleep. Sometimes he would sleep in the living room, sometimes he would sleep with his parents.
- [13:34]
Madeline Barron
He spent a lot of time next door with his uncles.
- [13:40]
Samara Freemark
They were like playing games with him, sometimes teasing him. So they used to like, prank him a lot, joke with him a lot. Yes.
- [13:52]
Madeline Barron
Was it almost more like they were your older brothers?
- [13:58]
Samara Freemark
Exactly. They were like big brothers to him.
- [14:02]
Madeline Barron
All the men in the family had jobs, good jobs. They were well off. After leaving the army, Khalid Jamal's father worked at a car dealership in town. Omega BMW. He made good money. Toyota. One of his father's brothers, Marwan, was an engineer for the government of a neighboring city. The youngest brother, Khatan, worked as a customs officer on the border with Jordan. Another brother, Jasib, was a traffic officer for the local police department. When Khalidjamal was 12 years old, his uncle Jasib married Ehab. Ehab moved into the house next door, and Khalid Jamal and his new aunt became really close.
- [14:47]
Samara Freemark
She was always joking around with him, playing with him.
- [14:53]
Madeline Barron
Khaled was still the only kid at that point, but everyone in the family was hoping that would change. They couldn't wait for Ehab and Chaseb to have a child. They kept asking, so are you pregnant? When will you have a baby? It was actually Ehab's brother in law, Marwan, who was the most insistent. Marwan was just so excited at the possibility when Ihab suspected that she might finally be pregnant. Marwan was the one who offered to drive Ehab and her husband Jasib to the clinic to get a pregnancy test.
- [15:36]
Samara Freemark
So, yeah, she's saying that it's more than her husband. He was eager to have, like, for the family to have another child. So when the results came out and she was pregnant, he was so happy.
- [15:49]
Madeline Barron
Marwan was beyond happy.
- [15:54]
Samara Freemark
He was so shocked that he just drove the car and went back home without them. He left them back at the clinic, vanished. He's saying that when he heard about this, he just vanished and went back home and forget about them in the clinic waiting for him to get them home. So she, like when she went back home, her and her husband, they were all cheering and chanting and they were all so happy about this news.
- [16:38]
Madeline Barron
Ehab gave birth to her son Bakr in 2004. Marwan ended up getting married too. The family just kept growing. When I was interviewing the three of them, Ehab Najla and Khalid Jamal, about this time in their lives, this time before everything changed, what struck me was their joy. Even now, with all that had happened, when they talked about that time, they still clearly felt that joy. It was present. You could feel it.
- [17:16]
Samara Freemark
She said that their life was so wonderful back then.
- [17:31]
Madeline Barron
The night before November 19, 2005, the whole family was hanging out together. One of Khalid Jamal's uncles, his father's youngest brother, Khatan, had just gotten back from a wedding.
- [17:51]
Samara Freemark
He was talking to them about the wedding. He was joking around. The whole family were gathered together to hear the stories about the wedding and everything.
- [18:02]
Madeline Barron
It was one of those simple but magical evenings. The whole family gathered, the four brothers, their wives and kids, and another baby on the way. Ehab was six months pregnant. Usually college, Amal's father was pretty strict about bedtime. But that night he let his son stay up late. It would be their last night together. So what do you remember about that next morning? Do you remember hearing the explosion? The family's story of the morning of November 19, 2005, starts with the IED exploding in the road nearby. Khalid Jamal still remembers the sound. The family woke up. Shrapnel started raining down.
- [18:55]
Samara Freemark
It was like raining the parts of the Humvee on their roof.
- [19:00]
Madeline Barron
So what did you do once you heard this?
- [19:06]
Samara Freemark
So he's saying that they continued their daily routine activities in the morning. Like his father, he was making his breakfast as usual before going to the dealership. But his mother noticed that their car, the BMW, it was new, noticed that there were two holes in their car.
- [19:41]
Madeline Barron
One of the pieces of the exploded Humvee had hit Khalid Jamal's father's brand new BMW. His father hadn't noticed yet.
- [19:54]
Samara Freemark
So she told him that if your father knows about that, he would be so sad and he would be so angry about it, like, because he liked this car and it was brand new.
- [20:06]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal ran across the yard to the house next door. The house where his grandparents and aunts and uncles and his one year old cousin lived.
- [20:18]
Samara Freemark
He was just going there to check on the rest of the family.
- [20:22]
Madeline Barron
Everyone over there was, okay, they're making breakfast, just like at his house. So Khalil Jamal turned around and went back home. The morning continued as normal. Khalil Jamal and his parents stayed inside, talking, doing whatever. Nothing remarkable. And then later that morning, a few hours after the IED had exploded, they suddenly heard shouting outside. And then someone started banging on the front door. And this is the part of the story where the accounts of Khalid Jamal and his family start to diverge from the Marine statements. Remember what the Marine said happened, how they said that they went to a house and realized that it was full of women and children. And when the Marines asked where the men were, the women pointed at the house next door. So two of the Marines went inside that house and immediately encountered armed insurgents, one of them pointing an AK47 right at them. A Marine fired first, and all four men were shot dead. But Khalid Jamal was saying that when the Marines arrived, the men weren't all huddled together in one house. They were in both houses doing their normal morning routines. Khalid Jamal's father was home with him and his mother, Najla and Khalid Jamal's uncles were in the other house with their families.
- [21:53]
Samara Freemark
His father just left what he was doing and he went in the front door to open the door.
- [22:00]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal's father opened the door, and Khalid Jamal saw the face of a man whose name he learned later.
- [22:10]
Samara Freemark
The first one that they saw was Frank.
- [22:15]
Madeline Barron
Sergeant Frank Wuderich. We'll be back after the break. Hi, it's Madeline. I'm gonna be honest with you. This season almost didn't happen. But we were able to report season three to its conclusion and bring it to you because we joined the New Yorker at inthedark. We believe that investigative reporting can lead to real change. That's why I'm asking you to become a New Yorker subscriber. The New Yorker brings you not just in the dark, but amazing nonfiction stories from the best writers and journalists working today. People like Rachel Aviv and Patrick Radden, Keith and Ronan Farrow. The New Yorker relies on subscribers. You literally make our work possible. So please go to newyorker.com dark and become a subscriber today. A Subscription starts at just a dollar a week and it gives you unlimited access to everything the New Yorker publishes. And of course you get a tote bag. That's newyorker.com Dark College Amal looked at the face of this Marine Sergeant Frank Wouterich.
- [23:50]
Samara Freemark
He remembers that he was shouting and his eyes were red and filled with anger. And he can remember that there was kind of blood on Frank's uniform.
- [24:12]
Madeline Barron
Two other Marines were with Corporal Salinas and Lance Corporal Sherritt. One of the Marines was holding a small gun. So he had like a pistol or something, like a handgun?
- [24:32]
Samara Freemark
Yes, she said, it's a small gun.
- [24:34]
Madeline Barron
From the type of gun, at least it sounded like Ehab could be describing Sheret because he was carrying Brian Witt's 9 millimeter and he was the only one in the squad that day who had a handgun.
- [24:48]
Samara Freemark
And he was shivering like his hands were shivering, like shaking. Shaking, yes.
- [24:54]
Madeline Barron
The other two Marines were carrying machine guns. One of the Marines started yelling at them, how was he talking? Like, could you talk like how he was talking? Alibaba. Boom.
- [25:08]
Samara Freemark
Boom. They are saying that he was so angry and he was just pointing at them and signaling, saying, did you see who did the bombing? Alibaba bomb. And they kept saying no because yes, okay. This is a nickname that the Marines or US Military named Al Qaeda. So Alibaba referred to Al Qaeda.
- [25:46]
Madeline Barron
The Marines asked if the family had any weapons. Iraqis at that time were allowed to have one AK47 per household. And it was common for the Marines to ask to see the weapon. When they showed up to search a house, Khalid Jamal's father told them yes. And he went and got the family's rifle and gave it to the Marines. It wasn't loaded. The Marines asked Khalid Jamal's dad about the other house, the one right next door. That's our family too. Khalid Jamal's dad told the Marines. The Marines then marched them all over to that house and everyone from the house next door came outside too.
- [26:34]
Samara Freemark
So they just came out one after one and they all stood there on their grandfather's front yard.
- [26:43]
Madeline Barron
The whole family was now out in the courtyard. The grandparents, the four brothers, three wives, including Najla and Ehab. Ehab was holding her one year old son Bakr. And there was 14 year old Khalid Jamal, 11 people in all. And just like at the first house, the Marines asked for any weapons. Ehab's husband Chaseb said, yes, we have a gun inside. And he went into the house with the Marines to get it. They came back outside with the weapon. Back out in the courtyard, Jasib tried talking to the Marines.
- [27:17]
Samara Freemark
Trying to talk to the Marine, trying to make him understand that he works with the government, that he's a police officer.
- [27:25]
Madeline Barron
Jasab was trying to tell the Marines, look, there's no way I'm a member of Al Qaeda. I'm a police officer. I'm basically on your side. If anything, Al Qaeda wants to kill me because of my job.
- [27:37]
Samara Freemark
But they didn't listen.
- [27:39]
Madeline Barron
By this point, according to the family's account, the Marines had shown up, searched both houses, and retrieved a single weapon from each house. The Marines now had those weapons in their possession. What happened next was rather curious. The Marines went off by themselves into one of the houses. What they were doing in there wasn't clear. Maybe they were discussing what to do next. After a few minutes, they came back outside. The Marines pointed at Khalid Jamal's father, at his Uncle Jasib, at his Uncle Marwan, and at his Uncle Katan. You and you and you. The Marines were ordering the men into the house.
- [28:33]
Samara Freemark
You and you and you. They pointed at each one to go inside the house.
- [28:39]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal started to go with his father and uncles, Liash, the Khaled.
- [28:44]
Samara Freemark
They didn't point at Khaleed, but Khaled wanted to go inside with them because he considered himself as a man as well at that time.
- [28:54]
Madeline Barron
But his Aunt Ahab pulled him back.
- [29:03]
Samara Freemark
So when Ihab saw the situation, she thought that Khaled is just a kid, and why would they want to ask him anything? Or why would they want any information from him? So she just picked him from his shoulders and dragged him and told him, come back here. And he went back and stood with everyone else.
- [29:28]
Madeline Barron
What were you thinking when your Aunt Ahab pulled you back? But I can hear. But I didn't.
- [29:39]
Samara Freemark
At that moment, he felt annoyed, like he thought that she didn't consider him as one of the family men. But he knew that it wasn't a good time for arguments, so he didn't say anything.
- [29:56]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal watched as his father and his father's three younger brothers were led back inside. There was a Marine in front of the men, leading them into the house and a Marine walking behind them. When your father and uncles went into the house, did your father say anything to you? Did you see him as he went into the house?
- [30:17]
Samara Freemark
No, he didn't say anything to him. He's saying that he remembers the last look or the last time he saw his father and his uncles. He remembers that the first one to go inside was his father, then his uncle Qahtan, and then his uncle Marwan, and then his uncle Jassib. So he went inside one by one, and he can remember that he couldn't see them anymore.
- [30:57]
Madeline Barron
This moment where the Marines separated the men from the women, children and elderly is not in any of the Marines statements. And if the family story is true, what they are describing is the Marines methodically marching four unarmed men into a house. The family says that the other Marine ordered the rest of them, the women, the children and the elderly, into the other house. Then the Marine closed the door on them. The Marine stood outside holding the door shut. What were you thinking when the Marine put you in your house?
- [31:37]
Samara Freemark
So they are saying that they both thought that worst case scenario, they will arrest them. They are being arrested.
- [31:47]
Madeline Barron
The women tried to push open the door, but the Marine held it closed. At one point, the Marine took his rifle and smashed it against a window.
- [31:59]
Samara Freemark
Broke the window just to scare them off, to make them quit wanting to open the door. And they got scared and they didn't try to open the door.
- [32:09]
Madeline Barron
And then they heard gunshots. Najla tried pushing the door open again, and this time it opened easily. And they realized that the Marine who'd been holding it closed had left. Najla and her son Khalid Jamal went straight to the house where her husband and his brothers had been taken. They went inside. The smell of gunpowder lingered in the air. Khalid Jamal saw his uncle Jasib on the ground. Abu Bakr and me, Chasibu.
- [32:45]
Samara Freemark
His eyes were still open.
- [32:48]
Madeline Barron
And his uncle Katan. Khalid Jamal opened the door of a large wooden wardrobe. And inside he found his uncle Marwan, shot in the head. Lying next to the wardrobe on the floor was his father. If glob tail gets.
- [33:09]
Samara Freemark
He went straight to see his father and he saw that his father had a hole in the back of his head.
- [33:18]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal got down on the floor and held his father in his arms.
- [33:25]
Samara Freemark
And he just lost it. He just didn't know what to do.
- [33:30]
Madeline Barron
Then Ehab came inside and saw her husband dead on the ground.
- [33:40]
Samara Freemark
She said that she basically sat on the floor between the bodies. She was six months pregnant and she just couldn't do anything. She just sat down between the bodies and she was shouting and crying.
- [34:06]
Madeline Barron
Did you have your son Bakker with you?
- [34:12]
Samara Freemark
She was holding him in her hands, so he was with her. She was searching, like, how did they die? She was searching for the gunshots and all the. All the gunshots were in the head. So she was saying that it's like their Brains came out.
- [34:39]
Madeline Barron
I'm so sorry you had to see that. While Ehab sat next to the bodies, Najla ran outside.
- [34:55]
Samara Freemark
She just lost it. She ran away on the street, and she was like knocking on every neighbor's door. She hoped that one of the neighbors could help her.
- [35:07]
Madeline Barron
So she was running, just house to house, just knocking, knocking. Najla finally found a neighbor who was willing to help. His name is Ausfami. Our colleague Namak talked to him in Haditha. Aus described how he ran toward Najla's house. He saw Marines on a rooftop. And then as he stood at Najla's door, he was shot. The bullet hit his stomach and he collapsed. His wife was watching all this from their house. Namak talked to her too, and she said that when she saw that her husband had been shot, she ran outside to help him. The Marines started shooting at her too, but they missed. She carried her husband down the street to get away from the Marines and brought him inside a neighbor's house, where they wrapped his wounds with towels, rags, anything they could find. At one point, they even used a clean diaper. Later that day, they took Ouse to the hospital. He survived, but it took him over a year before he could walk again. Back inside the house where the four brothers lay, Ehab stayed sitting on the ground next to the body of her husband for hours, holding their baby boy, Bakr, and screaming. The more Ehab screamed, the more Bakr cried. And Ehab was too distraught to comfort him.
- [36:29]
Samara Freemark
She didn't feed him for like seven hours because basically she was in shock.
- [36:38]
Madeline Barron
After a while, some other Marines came in and told them they had to leave. Ihab got up off the ground and went outside. But all that night, Bakr wouldn't stop crying. Najla's night was a blur. She spent it at a relative's house. Her son, Khalid Jamal wandered off and spent hours outside. He didn't know where he was or what he was doing. At a certain point, relatives found him and brought him back to their house.
- [37:17]
Samara Freemark
He fainted and slept till 3am the next morning. And he woke up and he was shocked, like, why I'm here? What am I doing here? And he thought that this is one of his uncle pranks. Jasseb and Marwan. He thought that they were pranking him.
- [37:55]
Madeline Barron
The next day, the family buried their dead. The grief hit everyone differently. Najla and Ehab had lost their husbands. Khalid Amal had lost his dad and his uncles, who were basically like brothers to him. Khalid Jamal's grandparents faced with the loss of four of their children, all at once, were devastated.
- [38:25]
Samara Freemark
The grandmother was so shocked that she ripped her clothes off and she just pulled her hair, and she didn't know what to do. She grabbed a knife and she wanted to kill herself because she couldn't handle the situation, the shock and everything. So they prevented her from doing that.
- [38:53]
Madeline Barron
But did they grab the money from her?
- [38:55]
Samara Freemark
Yes, they did. Yeah.
- [38:57]
Madeline Barron
And Khalid Jamal's grandfather lost his sight.
- [39:06]
Samara Freemark
They are saying that the grandfather, he was crying a lot, that he went blind.
- [39:14]
Madeline Barron
He actually went blind.
- [39:16]
Samara Freemark
No, they said that. That they took him to a doctor, and the doctor said his eyes are fine, but he don't want to see anymore. It's like nothing worth seeing anymore. And he died after them. Seven months.
- [39:41]
Madeline Barron
A few months after the killings, Ehab gave birth to her second child. She named him Omar. In the years after their husbands were killed, Ehab and Najla grew even closer. Najla helped Ehab raise her children. They relied on each other to get through.
- [40:06]
Samara Freemark
Whenever Ahab was, like, upset or feeling down, she would go to Najla to calm her down. She tells all her secrets to Najla. She's saying they are like, she's like a mother or sister or more than a friend to her. It's like all of this.
- [40:33]
Madeline Barron
In Najla, Khalid Jamal grew up being raised by his mother and also by his aunt, Ehab. He got married, and he and his wife had a son. When his son was born, Khalid Jamal made a phone call to the person he credited with saving his life, the person who made it possible for him to still be alive, to become a father. He called his aunt Ehabar.
- [41:03]
Samara Freemark
She's saying that when he called her, he was basically thanking her a lot and a lot and a lot. And she didn't know what he was thanking her for. But then he said that, thank you for letting me be in this moment, to live this moment and to see my son being born.
- [41:22]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal was thanking his aunt for that split second decision so many years ago to pull him away from his father and uncles, to keep him from going inside that house. I brought some documents with me to Iraq. The statements of the Marines about what happened that day. We have looked at the statements of the Marines who were. Who did this. So we could tell them what they. We could. If they want, we could tell them what those Marines claimed.
- [42:17]
Samara Freemark
They would like to know about these kind of statements. And they said that they didn't know how the investigation went. They didn't know anything. So they want to know.
- [42:28]
Madeline Barron
Okay, so the three Marines who were there, their names are Frank Wuderich, Justin Sharratt, and Hector Salinas. I started telling them the Marine story about how they saw something suspicious that drew them to the houses. How when they arrived, the women and children were oddly, all in that one house. And when the Marines asked where the men were, they pointed to the house next door. I explained how the Marines said they went into that house and what they said happened inside. What they say happened is that one of the men Inside had an AK47 and tried to shoot them, and then they killed the men. As I was telling them all this, Najla and Ehab were shaking their heads. No, no, Najla, you look very surprised. Yeah, you're shaking your head. Did not happen.
- [43:21]
Samara Freemark
Yeah, exactly. She said, it's insane. This is not what happened. Yes, Najla said, it's insane. This is not what happened.
- [43:32]
Madeline Barron
All three of them were insistent the Marines story was absolutely false. And the idea that any of these men, their family members, were insurgents, that was absurd to them. IYA reminded us that her husband, Chasib, worked as a traffic officer for the local police department, a job that insurgents killed people for having. She even pulled out a photo to prove it. Oh, is that a picture of her.
- [43:55]
Samara Freemark
Husband and his uniform? Yes. What uniform is that? Sergeant Muror, Traffic police.
- [44:07]
Madeline Barron
We also talked to several other people who lived in Haditha then and now, and they all describe this family the same way. Comfortable, good jobs, well regarded, nice people. Definitely not insurgents. How does it feel to learn this?
- [44:29]
Samara Freemark
So I have saying that this Marine who's claiming that this was his truth, she said that he knows the truth as she knows it. She said that the killing of her husband and his brothers wasn't like something for defending themselves. They just shot them. And she said that she is certain that this man knows the truth and knows that he killed those people without any reason. She doesn't care at all what he says.
- [45:14]
Madeline Barron
We'll be back after the break.
- [45:26]
Samara Freemark
I'm Vincent Cunningham.
- [45:27]
Madeline Barron
I'm Alex Schwartz. And I'm Nomi Frye. And we're Critics at Large, the New York Times Flagship Culture Podcasts. Flagship. Flagship. Love that. We want to invite you to a special live event that's coming right up on March 11th at the bell House in Brooklyn. We're doing a show about a classic conundrum for critics. What happens when you write a review and you get it wrong?
- [45:50]
Samara Freemark
We will be looking back at some of the classic pieces of New Yorker.
- [45:54]
Madeline Barron
Criticism that may have missed the Mark. Like, for example, a scathing review that declared the wizard of Oz a stinkeroo marred by eye straining. Technicolor, not a stinkeroo. Oh, yes. And of course we will also talk about critics who got it right as well. So if you're in New York or if you feel like traveling, come see us live at the bell House on March 11th. You can buy tickets@thebellhouseny.com we'll see you there. One day while we were talking with Khalid Jamal, we turned off the air conditioner in the hotel room because it was so noisy. But at one point it got so hot we had to take a break. Yeah, okay. Let's turn on the air conditioning. Take a little break. Samara called down to the lobby and ordered coffee and pastries. Hi, is this room service? Hi. I wanted to order. While we were waiting, Khalid Jamal asked me a question. He asked me whether I had ever talked to Frank Wouterich. Also an iced coffee. Not yet. No. And then Khalid Jamal said something surprising. I hope to meet. He wanted to talk to wich I want to ask him.
- [47:24]
Samara Freemark
Okay.
- [47:27]
Madeline Barron
I need to ask him one question only. Just one question. How did he kill them? I want to explain. How did he that and in our house, how? Khalid Jamal told us that he's always wanted to know what happened in his father and uncle's final moments. I want that. Why? I want to know what's happened in the room. Because you don't know. Yes, I saw the bodies. Only I want to know how he did this killings of my father, my uncles. And ask just question and just answer off from him. Khalid Jamal has always had this instinct to want to know, to want the truth of his father and uncle's final moments to be revealed. Even in the days after the killings, as a kid, it was on his mind. I've seen a video taken maybe a day after the killings. In the video, 14 year old Khalid Jamal is sitting in a room as the camera focuses on him. He leans forward, looks directly into the lens. Put me on tv. He shouts. He motions for the cameraman to film the ground. The camera moves to reveal a body wrapped in a brown and yellow blanket. This, Khalijamal says, gesturing to the body, his voice hoarse. This is my father. This instinct to document, to show what happened, has stayed with Khalid Jamal. He's precise, analytical. He's a lecturer in computer science. He brought his computer to the interview. He showed us a folder on his desktop. Research he'd done online into the killings of his father and uncles. I have my Laptop. So what do you have on your computer? Folder? In the folder I show for whom a folder is in. What's the folder called? Documents. Khalidjamal, of course, didn't have the government documents that we'd gotten from our lawsuits. All those investigative records, the Marines original statements. But he found what was available online. Mostly old news articles. He'd used Google Translate to translate them into Arabic.
- [50:18]
Samara Freemark
He spent lots of time on the search. Every time he finds something, he put it in his folder.
- [50:26]
Madeline Barron
The stuff that Khalid Jamal had found online mostly had to do with the squad leader, Frank Wouterich. He'd even found Wouterich's old Facebook page. So you just pulled him up? Here he is. So this is his Facebook page you just pulled up on your phone. What were you hoping to find when you looked at his Facebook?
- [50:50]
Samara Freemark
So he was curious to know, who was this person? He looked up his Facebook account to just to know, what does this person look like? Where did he study? What did he study? His friends, his family and everything.
- [51:09]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal has looked at Woodrich's Facebook page over and over again. It was a strange position to be in, knowing the name of one of the Marines who was involved in the killing of his father and uncles, and knowing that that man wasn't in prison. He was just out in the world on Facebook, doing regular things, raising his own family. Khalid Jamal even thought about getting in touch with Frank Wouterich sometimes. He thought maybe I could just message him and ask him what happened in my father's final moments. Sometimes he wished he could send Wouterich a photo of the bodies of his family.
- [51:47]
Samara Freemark
He wanted to take a photo of that and send it to Frank and tell him that I hope this stays with you for your whole life.
- [51:55]
Madeline Barron
Ori thought about sending Wuderych photos of his younger cousins, Bakr and Omar. Bakar was just a year old when his father was killed. And Omar wasn't even born yet.
- [52:09]
Samara Freemark
He had the photos of his cousins. He wants to show it to him, to compare. Like why those children was raised without their father.
- [52:21]
Madeline Barron
In the end, Khalid Jamal didn't do any of these things. But he keeps going over and over that day in his mind, wondering exactly what happened inside that house. Who was killed first? Was it his father? Or did his father have to watch as his brothers were executed before being killed himself? Khalid Jamal has even dreamt about this. He dreamed he was there in the house, watching it all unfold.
- [52:50]
Samara Freemark
How did they die? Did they die like brave men? Or were they scared? Like, what happened? Did they struggle? Did they fought back with. With their hands. What did they do? He wants to know the little details after they couldn't see them anymore.
- [53:13]
Madeline Barron
And how does it feel not to know, Kev?
- [53:24]
Samara Freemark
He thinks about this, like, every time. It's like keeping his mind busy with the incident that happened that day.
- [53:34]
Madeline Barron
Khalid Jamal's question, what happened in those final moments wasn't just his. His family shared it. Iyab told me how badly she wants to know those detail.
- [53:54]
Samara Freemark
She's saying that she always thinks to herself that who was killed first and if so, who saw the other being murdered in front of them. And she's like, their relationship is so strong.
- [54:14]
Madeline Barron
I'm sorry.
- [54:37]
Samara Freemark
She said that their relationship was so strong. They were really wanted. And she just. She just wants to know who been murdered first. Not for punishment or anything, just.
- [55:03]
Madeline Barron
Ehab was saying she just wanted to know what happened. One evening while we were in Erbil, we met up with Khaled Jamal and climbed up to the top of the city's ancient citadel. We leaned on the stone parapets and looked down at the city. The place is here. Beautiful. I'd spent a fair amount of time with Khalid Amal by then, and it was clear that he wanted more than anything to know more about what happened to his father and uncles. And so I decided to tell him that there were photos of his dead father and uncles. Photos I'd never seen, photos the Marines had taken on the night of the killings. I explained that the photos had been kept from the public and that the government claimed it had sealed the photos in part to protect the survivors. So we've obtained a lot of documents in the case, but one of the things we haven't been able to get are a lot of photos of the killings, photos that were taken by the US Military. And those photos were sealed by a military judge. And when they were sealed, they said the reason was because, number one, national security. And then also because the families of the people who were killed might be traumatized if they were to see the photos. And for us, the photos might help us give us more evidence of what happened that day. And I told him about an idea. So we talked to our lawyer in the United States. And one thing he said is that if you and other family members would be willing to sign a form that says that you're okay with the photos being released, then we could show that to the American judge and see if that judge will would agree to release the photos. If the family members wanted us to have the photos, they could sign a release saying that and then maybe a judge would order the military to give them to us. There's no guarantee the judge would agree to that. And it's completely up to you whether or not you want to sign a form like that. But I just wanted to offer it as a possibility. Without missing a beat, Khalid Amal said, I'm ready to sign. I actually asked Khalid Jamal to think about it. I didn't accept his answer. In the moment, it didn't seem appropriate to resolve it all right there. I wanted him to really think it through. And when he did, he was just as certain. He also offered to bring the form to other people in Hiditha who'd lost family members in the killings that day. And so one day, two years ago, Khalid Jamal set off. He was joined by the other Khalid Khalid, Salman Rasif, the lawyer who'd lost 15 loved ones that day and who'd spent years trying to get justice. These two men went house to house, explaining the reporting, explaining who we were, asking people if they would consider signing the form. At one house, Khalid Jamal told a father of one of the victims, of course, I am one of you, and asked him to sign the release, saying, things that happened in the massacre will be exposed. The father said, the drowning man will cling to the straw. We do it, we sign, we sign. I will sign it twice, not once. Visiting Safa Khalid Salman Rasif explained why they are collecting signatures surrounded by her own children. She agreed, writing, I am the daughter of Yunus Salam. And so it went, the two Khalids going house to house, collecting signatures from fathers, mothers, wives, sons and daughters, until finally they had collected 17 signatures in all. We sent the signed forms to our lawyers and our lawyers filed them in court. If you want to listen to episode six right now ad free, you can do that by subscribing to the New Yorker. Subscribers will get all of our remaining episodes ad free a week early. Go to newyorker.com dark to subscribe and listen now. In the Dark is reported and produced by me, Madeline Barron, managing producer Samara Freemark, producers Natalie Jablonski and Raymond Tungakar and reporter Parker Yesko. In the Dark is edited by Catherine Winter and Willing Davidson, reporting and investigating in Iraq by BBC Arabic's Namak Khoshnau and field producer Haider Ahmed. Interpreting in Iraq by Aya Muthena Additional interpreting and translation by Aya Al Shakarchi this episode was fact checked by Lucy Croning and Linnea Feldman Emerson Original music by Alison Layton Brown Sound design and mix by John Delore Our theme is by Gary Meister. Our art is by Emiliano Ponzi. Art direction by Nicholas Conrad and Aviva Michalov. FOIA Legal representation from the FOIA team at Lovi and Lovie Legal Review by Fabio Bertoni in the Dark was created by American Public Media and is produced by the New Yorker. Our Managing editor is Julia Rothschild. The head of Global audio for Conde Nast is Chris Fannin. The editor of the New Yorker is David Remnick. If you have comments or story tips, you can send them to us@inthedarkewyorker.com and make sure to follow in the Dark wherever you get your podcasts. I'm David Remnick, host of the New Yorker Radio Hour. There's nothing like finding a story you can really sink into that lets you tune out the noise and focus on what matters in print or here on the podcast. The New Yorker brings you thoughtfulness and depth and even humor that you can't find anywhere else. So please join me every week for the New Yorker Radio Hour. Wherever you listen to podcasts from PRX.