Royal Marine tells court martial he was ‘stunned’ over Afghan prisoner shooting

The man, identified only as Marine B, says he had no idea his colleague, Marine A, was going to fire on suspected insurgent

A Royal Marine has told a court martial that he was “stunned and shocked” when his patrol sergeant shot an injured Afghan prisoner in the chest at close range.

The man, who can only be identified as Marine B, said he had no inkling that his colleague, Marine A, was about to fire on the suspected insurgent, who was lying wounded and helpless. “I was stunned and shocked at what I had just seen,” said Marine B.

Marine A has claimed that he had believed the prisoner was already dead when he fired at him but Marine B told the court martial he thought the Taliban fighter was alive. Marine B conceded he tried to cover up what happened but said he did this to protect a fellow marine.

The incident in Helmand in September 2011 was recorded on a head camera worn by Marine B, then an acting lance corporal. The video footage shows the insurgent, who had been wounded in a helicopter attack, being dragged across a field. Marine A is seen shooting the man in the chest with a pistol. Marines B and C are accused of assisting and encouraging A. All three men deny murder.

Marine B, a university graduate who had only been in the corps for 16 months at the time of the shooting, said the Taliban were brutal and resourceful.

He had seen a colleague’s leg that had been blown off in a bomb attack hung in a tree as a trophy and had to clean up after another comrade suffered massive head injuries in a grenade assault. “I picked my mate’s brains off the floor,” he told the court.

Asked about abusive language he used towards the insurgent, B said he was speaking out of “frustration” because the prisoner was suspected of attacking a British base.

But he said he had never thought about avenging his colleagues by abusing or killing a prisoner. He said he had given the detainee first aid and was trying to save his life. “I regarded it as the right thing to do as a human being,” he said.

As he treated the man, he heard Marine C suggest he shoot the man in his head and Marine B reply that it would be too obvious. B said he thought C’s remark was “bravado” but he was “troubled” by A’s response.

A’s barrister, Martin Meeke, asked him about the moment when A opened fire.

Meeke asked B: “Had you any inkling that A was intent on firing?” B replied: “None whatsoever, no.” B acknowledged that he laughed after Marine A shot the prisoner but he said this was a nervous reaction.

The video picks up B suggesting that if the round A discharged was heard, they explain it away as a “warning shot”. B admitted that he was covering for A.

“I was protecting Marine A because he had just breached the Geneva Convention,” he said. B …read more