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Ilario Pantano

Ilario G. Pantano (born 1971 in New York City) is a former United States Marine Corps second lieutenant who is an author and television commentator, and serves as a Deputy Sheriff in North Carolina. He first came to national prominence when he was accused of premeditated murder in the killing of two suspected Iraqi insurgents on April 15, 2004. A military tribunal found that there was no credible evidence or testimony for the accusation, and declined to prosecute Pantano, dropping all charges. Shortly thereafter, Pantano resigned his officer's commission and was honorably discharged. These events, and his other experiences as a combat Marine during the Persian Gulf War and in Iraq in 2004 are the subject of his successful memoir, "Warlord: No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy."

Biography

Pantano was born in New York City and grew up in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan. His father was an Italian-born tour guide and his mother was a Kansas native who is now a literary agent.

Pantano attended the private high school school Horace Mann in New York, on scholarship. Following graduation he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps and participated in the first Gulf War as a TOW gunner. Pantano completed Scout Sniper training, and was promoted to Sergeant, remaining in the Marine Corps until 1993.

Return to civilian life

Following his return to civilian life, Pantano earned an economics degree from New York University. He built a successful career as an energy trader for Goldman Sachs, and moved on to become a movie producer with a New York firm called The Shooting Gallery. He would later be a cofounder of a company specializing in interactive television, Filter Media. Pantano married Jill Chapman, a fashion model, who had appeared in Italian Vogue. The couple would later have two children.

Rejoins the USMC

Immediately after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Pantano decided to rejoin the Marines. Pantano's apartment was next to a fire station where eleven firemen, four of whom were former Marines, perished in the 9/11 attacks.

He was accepted as an officer candidate, and after completing Officer Candidate School was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant, at the age of thirty.

He was a popular officer and his superiors described him as the best platoon commander in his battalion. His men reported that they appreciated the extra training drills he put them through.

Return to Iraq, 2004

Pantano went to Iraq in February 2004 with 2nd Battalion 2nd Marines. This was quickly followed by the intense fighting in Fallujah during Operation Vigilant Resolve in April 2004. On April 15, 2004, acting on intelligence extracted from captured opposition fighters, Lieutenant Pantano led his platoon against a compound near the town of Mahmudiyah.

April 15th incident

As the platoon approached the compound, they saw a vehicle with two Iraqis in it. Pantano ordered his men to stop the vehicle and to have the occupants of the vehicle handcuffed. The vehicle was searched for weapons. Lieutenant Pantano remained with the captives, while the rest of his platoon secured the compound. The compound was deserted, but his men found a cache of arms, including "several mortar aiming stakes, a flare gun, three AK47 rifles, 10 AK magazines with assault vests and IED making material."

When Pantano learned that the compound contained weapons, he ordered Sergeant Daniel Coburn and Corpsman George Gobles to watch for enemies. He then released the captives from their bonds, violating basic detainee handling procedures calling for detainees to be segregated from each other. According to a statement Lieutenant Pantano made to military investigators in June 2004, he then used hand signals to order the captives to search the vehicle again. According to Pantano, during the search of the vehicle he felt the Iraqis posed a threat to him. They were talking, and Pantano believed they were conspiring together. When they both turned to face each other, he shouted "Stop!" in both Arabic and English, and when they did not, he shot them. After emptying his magazine, he continued to fire. He later stated: "I then changed magazines and continued to fire until the second magazine was empty...I had made a decision that when I was firing I was going to send a message to these Iraqis and others that when we say, 'No better friend, No worse enemy,' we mean it. I had fired both magazines into the men, hitting them with about 80 percent of my rounds."

Indictment

In June 2004, Sergeant Coburn registered a complaint about the incident, triggering a Naval Criminal Investigative Service probe.

On February 1, 2005, Pantano was charged with two counts of premeditated murder, and faced the death penalty if convicted.

Article 32 hearing

On April 14, 2005, Pantano tried to waive his right to an Article 32 pretrial hearing, in an effort to speed the process toward a court martial. Pantano claimed that the government was withholding key evidence and witnesses and according to a statement made by his mother, waived his right to a hearing "in order to get a Military Judge to compel the prosecution to produce witnesses and evidence in his case." The military denied this request and the Article 32 hearing was held on April 26, 2005 with Major Mark Winn as the presiding officer.

Autopsy report

Prior to Pantano's Article 32 hearing the Department of Defense had maintained that it was impossible to do a post-mortem examination on the corpses of Lieutenant Pantano's captives because they were buried in a cemetery that was in an area that was not under American control. However, shortly before the hearing, the bodies were exhumed after all. The autopsy report was released the day after the Article 32 recommendation was made and, according to the Washington Times, supported Lt. Pantano's contention that he had shot the men as they approached him in a threatening fashion..

Pantano's statements

Pantano acknowledged leaving a sign on a car above the corpses that said, "No better friend, No worse enemy," but then returned to remove it after one of his colleagues called it 'inappropriate'. This phrase is the motto of his Marine Corps battalion, and is promoted by his battalion commander as the combat philosophy of their unit. The slogan is also a popular Marine saying popularized by Lieutenant General James Mattis, then commanding general of the 1st Marine Division.

In an interview with the BBC from March 20, 2005, Lieutenant Pantano said, "I'm a New Yorker and 9/11 was a pretty significant event for me, our duty as Marines is, quite frankly, to export violence to the four corners of the globe, to make sure that this doesn't happen again."

Witnesses

Navy Corpsman George Goble was present but did not witness the danger Lieutenant Pantano reported, because he was looking outwards, as ordered. He later stated when he turned back he saw the Iraqis trying to run away.

Sergeant Coburn is reported to have said "As soon as I turned my back, Lt. Pantano opened [fire] with approximately 45 rounds." Coburn, throughout the case, gave five distinctly separate versions of events. Lieutenant Pantano's defense counsels have said they believe that Sergeant Daniel Coburn's account should not be given any credit, because he was disgruntled, having been demoted recently by Pantano.

Another witness, "Corporal 'O'", was an Arabic-speaking Nigerian-American in Pantano's platoon. His full name was kept confidential at Pantano's hearing because he is being trained for counter-intelligence duties.

In his testimony at Pantano's hearing, Corporal "O" described interviewing the two captives. He described seeing the vehicle being searched by other Marines, including the removal of its seats. He described seeing the corpses of the captives, following the shooting, face down, with the heads and torsos in the vehicle and their knees resting on the ground, as if Pantano shot the captives in the back while they were kneeling facing the vehicle. Corporal "O" described the sight as "weird".

Sergeant Coburn was heavily criticized for some interviews he had given (he was under a gag order) as well as untruths concerning the evidence in the case.

Coburn's internet statements

The blogosphere also played a major role. Coburn made remarks on Euphoric Reality during the case that were in direct contradiction of his statements to naval investigators. The blog owner turned in the comments to Pantano's attorney, who confronted Coburn on the stand with his own remarks in a dramatic cross-examination that resulted in Coburn being taken off the stand and read his Miranda rights. Coburn returned to the stand the following day after being granted immunity.

Recommendations

Major Winn recommended to Major General Huck, commander of Lieutenant Pantano's division that the murder charges be dropped. It was his assessment that Sergeant Coburn was an uncredible witness. He did however recommend that Pantano receive nonjudicial punishment for conduct unbecoming an officer, for the sign he left on the corpses. He described Lieutenant Pantano's treatment of his captive's corpses as a "desecration".

Under U.S. military law, the decision as to whether a court-martial should take place lay solely with General Huck, who dropped all charges.

Website, internet threats

On February 12, 2005, Lieutenant Pantano's mother appeared on CNN to publicize his case, and to tell the public about the site she founded for his defense. The website created by Pantano's mother reported that the Iraqis had advanced on him in a threatening manner, that he had ordered them to stop, and fired on them, in self-defense when they failed to do so. Prior to the press finding access to Lieutenant Pantano's statement, journalists and bloggers sympathetic to Pantano echoed the version on his mother's website.

On February 17, 2005, it was reported that Ms. Pantano's site went down, and a parallel site with a similar name went up. It was reported that the parallel site contained threats against Pantano, and his family; that it contained a video simulating Pantano being decapitated. Retired Marines are reported to have volunteered to stand a security watch over Pantano's home.

Autobiography

On June 12, 2006, Pantano's autobiographical account of his experiences, Warlord: No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy, was released by Threshold Editions, Mary Matalin's Simon & Schuster imprint. On July 10, 2006, he appeared as a guest on The Daily Show to promote the book.

Support

Pantano received much support from internet websites and organizations which specialize in supporting the troops. He also received backing from talk radio personalities, specifically Michael Savage who spent day after day raising awareness of Pantano's situation and even conducted several interviews with Pantano and his family.

Sheriff's deputy

In February 2007, Pantano and fifteen other veterans completed a law enforcement course at the Cape Fear Community College. He was hired as a Sheriff's deputy on February 22 2007, where he will serve as a guard in a correctional facility. Pantano was characterized as the star pupil in his course. Pantano stated that serving as a Sheriff's deputy represented the current height of his ambition.