Steven Green update:jury in deliberations for penalty for rape/murders while in Iraq

A Kentucky jury began deliberating Wednesday whether a former US soldier should be executed for the gang rape and murder of an Iraqi girl and the slaughter of her family. Steven Dale Green was described alternately as "criminal and perverse" and deserving of the death penalty, and as a "broken warrior" whose life should be spared during closing arguments of his sentencing hearing.

Death and life without parole are the only options available to the jury which convicted Green on May 7 of raping and killing 14-year old Abeer al-Janabi and murdering her mother, father and six-year old sister.Three other soldiers were given life sentences in the March 2006 atrocity devised over whiskey and a game of cards at a traffic check point in Mahmudiyah, south of Baghdad.

Green, who was named as the ringleader, was tried in civilian court after being discharged from the army due to a "personality disorder" before his role in the crime came to light. "The victims in this case cry out for justice from their graves," assistant US attorney Brian Skared told jurors in his closing argument Wednesday morning.

Skared maintained the defense had been playing a "blame game," filling the sentencing phase with potential scapegoats who testified about Green's chaotic and neglectful childhood and shoddy leadership of his unit in Iraq in an attempt to deflect responsibility away from Green. "They've tried to make Mr Green a victim in this case," he said. Instead, he said Green was not acting on instinct or impulse when he killed the Janabi family but had planned the rape and murders with a "criminal and perverse mind" and then celebrated when it was over.

Skared rejected the notion that the stresses of war and losses of others in Green's unit somehow led him to commit the acts. "If they knew their deaths were somehow being provided as mitigation for this, they would roll over in their graves," he said. "None of that explains what he did to this family."...

Views differ on Steven Green brain scan

By Brett Barrouquere - The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday May 19, 2009 17:54:34 EDT

PADUCAH, Ky. — It’s nearly impossible to tell if a former soldier convicted of killing an Iraqi family has brain damage because of the method used to scan his brain, a neurologist testified Tuesday. Dr. Helen Mayberg, a professor at Emory University in Atlanta, said the wrong protocols were used during an MRI of former Pfc. Steven Dale Green. Instead of what amounted to a complete scan of Green’s brain, his MRI included pauses between each scan, Mayberg said.

The group he was compared to consisted of full brain scans, rendering any comparison between Green and the group invalid, Mayberg said. “He was done differently,” said Mayberg, the final witness for the prosecution. “It’s no big surprise that there are some areas that look different.”

Mayberg’s testimony closed the penalty phase of Green’s rape and murder trial. Jurors will hear closing arguments Wednesday about whether Green, 24, of Midland, Texas, should be sentenced to death or imprisoned for life. The jury convicted Green on May 7 of raping and killing 14-year-old Abeer Qassim al-Janabi and shooting her family to death in March 2006, near Mahmoudiya, Iraq, about 20 miles south of Baghdad....

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On Tuesday, testimony centered around highly technical talk about Green's brain. At issue was an MRI presented into evidence last week by the defense team and the analysis that followed suggesting that Green may have damaged part of his brain at some point in his life.

Dr. Helen Mayberry, a clinical neurologist from Emory University, testified for the prosecution, questioning at length the scientific methods of a doctor who testified for the defense -- as jurors looked at scans of Green's brain and a bailiff dozed in the back of the courtroom. A week earlier, Dr. Rubin Gur of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine compared Green's brain scan to 41 others, saying his was significantly different than the others and possibly showed signs of one large or several small head injuries.

The prosecution has noted that Green's verbal scores on standardized tests were above average.

The defense has argued that Green's childhood was troubled and stressful, calling relatives and medical professionals to paint a picture that included the breakup of his parents marriage, regular beatings by an older brother and being moved around Texas by his mother. An aunt testified that she wasn't sure the Army would accept Green after he got his high school degree through a correspondence course and that she never thought he would make it through basic training....