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By Dennis Cauchon, Debbie Howlett and Rick Hampson, USA TODAY
He was a former Marine who wound up as a state prison guard. She worked the night shift at a chicken-processing plant an hour's drive from home and dreamed of going to college to become a meteorologist.
Both had failed marriages behind them. Both had joined an Army military police reserve unit that seemed to offer things that life in small-town Appalachia didn't. They were sent to Iraq last year, after the war began. There, romance blossomed and she got pregnant. There, the couple became central figures in the images of abused Iraqi prisoners that have shocked the world and threatened to undermine America's war effort. Spc. Charles Graner, 35, of Uniontown, Pa., and Pfc. Lynndie England, 21, of Fort Ashby, W.Va., appear repeatedly in photographs that show soldiers from the 372nd Military Police Company grinning and gesturing around naked, hooded Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. Why is still unclear. Although the Army is investigating charges that could lead to courts-martial for Graner and at least five other reservists, the soldiers' families and supporters say they were acting under orders of superiors who were determined to get information out of prisoners. "Scapegoats — that's what they're being used for," says Destiny Goin, who grew up with England.
In the days of Saddam Hussein, Abu Ghraib was one of the world's most notorious prisons, known to Iraqis as a place where the dictator's regime tortured or killed thousands. U.S. military officials say the prison's inmates now include Iraqi insurgents who have targeted U.S. troops, villagers who helped the insurgents, and some innocent citizens scooped up in the chaos of war. Some relatives of the reservists who face abuse charges have complained that some of the reservists, lacking the training to deal with such detainees, were put in difficult positions by the demands of military intelligence officers. Still, the photos of smiling reservists alongside abused Iraqi prisoners seem particularly bizarre to many of the reservists' friends and family members back home. Most of the suspects have been called mild-mannered and duty-bound, with the exception being Graner, whose ex-wife accused him of being violent with her a few years ago. No charges were filed against him then. On Thursday, Graner was still in Iraq, along with others in the Cumberland, Md.-based military police unit who face charges in the scandal: Staff Sgt. Ivan Frederick of Buckingham, Va.; Sgt. Javal Davis and Spc. Megan Ambuhl, both of western Maryland; Spc. Sabrina Harman of Lorton, Va.; and Spc. Jeremy Sivits of Hyndman, Pa. England, meanwhile, has been assigned to Fort Bragg, N.C., and is confined to the base. The military says she has been "detained" in the investigation, which is continuing. Military, media blamed England's friends and family say she is similar to Jessica Lynch, another young woman from rural West Virginia who joined the military to broaden her horizons. When Lynch's Army unit was attacked during the war's early days, England's family says, the military and the news media inaccurately created a heroine. In England's case, they say, the same parties are creating a villainess. England's brother-in-law, James Klinestiver, describes her as "a paper pusher" — a clerk assigned to fingerprint and process prisoners, not to interrogate or control them. He and Goin say England worked in a different wing of the prison than Graner, who guarded prisoners, and that she went to the inmates' section to visit him. "It's ridiculous," Goin says. "It's her picture you see more than anyone else's, and she really wasn't involved. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time." And certainly in the wrong pictures. The photos, which have spread around the globe, show England — with her boyish build, T-shirt and pixie haircut — smiling, pointing and giving thumbs-up as she and her colleagues mock prisoners. In one shot, she's pointing to the genitals of a naked, hooded Iraqi; in another, she and a man the military has identified as Graner are grinning and standing arm-in-arm, behind a pile of naked Iraqis. Her mother, Terri England, had said she was sick of seeing the photos. Then, Thursday, there was a new one: a shot of Lynndie England holding what appears to be a leash wrapped around the neck of a naked Iraqi detainee. Even so, Terri England says her daughter is innocent. "She has more values than that," she told CBS News. "She's a good girl." That's how she generally is remembered in Fort Ashby: a kid who liked to go outside during storms, who loved the movie Twister, who wanted to be a meteorologist who chased tornadoes. Instead, she joined the Army reserve even before she got out of high school. When she was 19 she married a local guy, David Fike, who was then 21. The marriage lasted about a year. When she went to Iraq last year, her photo was posted with those of other service members on the local Wal-Mart's Wall of Honor. It was still there Thursday. But by midmorning, England's parents had left their home in a trailer park at the end of a dirt road off Highway 46 in Fort Ashby. "They've gone away," Goin says. "We just need a break." There's also disbelief on Graner's street in Uniontown, a former mining town 75 miles away. "I'm surprised," says Tom Zavada, who lives a block from Graner's house. "You expect to see (wartime detainees) beat up, but you don't expect to see them being humiliated. ... I wouldn't think Chuck would come up with this kind of plan himself. He may have been following instructions. We just have to wait and see." Graner was a guard at a maximum-security state prison in Greene County, Pa. Zavada says Graner spent most of his time working, rotating shifts and collecting as much overtime as possible. In his free time, he remodeled his home or watched his children, 13 and 11. "He worked hard and took care of his kids," Zavada says. Graner and his wife, Staci, separated in 1997. In court papers, he accused her of trading their relationship for another one. Over the next four years, Staci Graner obtained three temporary protection of abuse orders. In an affidavit for the first order, Staci Graner said Charles Graner threatened to kill her and told her "that she could keep his guns, because he did not need them for what he was going to do to the plaintiff." A judge ordered the couple to conduct their child custody exchanges at the police station. For the 1998 order, Staci Graner testified that one night Charles Graner sneaked into the house where she was living with their children and jumped out at her from the laundry room to scare her. "I just don't think this is normal behavior, and he does frighten me," she testified. "I don't want him anywhere near me." Her affidavit said that Charles Graner "set up a video camera in my house without my knowledge and showed me the tapes." In 2001, Staci Graner filed a five-page, handwritten affidavit. She said that Charles Graner had come to her house and "yanked me out of bed by my hair, dragging me and all the covers into the hall and tried to throw me down the steps." Staci Graner could not be reached for comment. Her ex-husband was not charged in connection with her complaints. Charles Graner was born and reared in Pittsburgh. He joined the Marines after graduating from high school in 1988, and he has the Marines' eagle emblem and the letters USMC tattooed on his right arm. He moved to Uniontown because his wife lived there, Zavada says, and got a job at the county jail before moving on to the state prison. The only known blemish on his work record came when he refused to work mandatory overtime one night because he had to care for his kids. His house was deserted Thursday, but outside a stone bore this inscription from the Book of Hosea: "Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until He comes and showers righteousness on you." Five hearings completed The suspects held in Iraq have been subject to Article 32 hearings, the equivalent of grand jury hearings under the military's justice system. Officers supervising the hearings typically hear evidence and then decide on charges. A Pentagon source familiar with the cases says that hearings have been completed, and charges have been prepared, for five of the six suspects held in Iraq. The source says the Army likely will announce the details next week. During Frederick's hearing, testimony indicated that the abuse scandal was brought to light by another member of the 372nd, Spc. Joseph Darby. Troubled by what was going on at the prison, Darby told his superiors that Graner had sent him pictures of detainees being abused. Army investigator Scott Bobeck told the court that Darby came forward because he "felt very bad about it, and thought it was very wrong." Graner's attorney, Guy Womack, has said that military intelligence officers and those from the CIA and other agencies called the shots at Abu Ghraib. He said his client and other accused MPs "were merely following orders" to soften up detainees for interrogations. Contributing: Dave Moniz in Washington and AP. Cauchon reported from Uniontown, Pa.; Howlett from Fort Ashby, W.Va.; and Hampson from New York City. |
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