SAN DIEGO — In stunning testimony that may upend the war crimes trial of Chief Edward Gallagher of the Navy SEALs, a SEAL medic told the court on Thursday that he — not the chief — had killed a wounded captive in Iraq. The medic, Special Operator First Class Corey Scott, testified that he watched Chief Gallagher stab the prisoner, a teenage ISIS fighter, in the neck, but that the stab wound did not appear to be life-threatening. After the chief walked away, Special Operator Scott told the court, he pressed his thumb over the captive’s breathing tube until he died. “I knew he was going to die anyway, and wanted to save him from waking up to whatever would have happened to him,” Special Operator Scott said, adding that he had seen other captives tortured and killed by Iraqi forces. A Navy official said that he could still face nonjudicial punishment, including being dropped from the SEALs or discharged from the Navy entirely.

Source: New York Times June 20, 2019 19:33 UTC