Reservist Gets 3-Year Term

Lynndie R. England, the Army Reserve private who posed for some of the most notorious photographs in the Abu Ghraib detainee abuse scandal, was sentenced Tuesday to three years in a military prison.

Of the multiple images that emerged from the prison in Iraq in late 2003, a picture of England -- wearing a military T-shirt and holding a dog leash attached to a naked Iraqi prisoner -- became an icon of the scandal.

The military jury hearing England’s court-martial at Ft. Hood, Texas, took about 90 minutes to determine her punishment. She also will receive a dishonorable discharge from the Army.

The jury’s decision ends a damaging episode in the U.S. war in Iraq, undercutting efforts to reach out to Arabs in the Middle East and to Muslim communities around the world -- even as a new potential scandal is emerging with fresh reports of abuse by regular Army troops in Fallouja.

In a statement Tuesday, before the jury of five officers decided her sentence, England, 22, expressed regret and said she was following the guidance of her boyfriend, a soldier she said she loved and trusted.

“After the photos were released, I’ve heard that attacks were made on U.S. armed forces because of them,” she said. “I apologize to coalition forces and their families that lost their life or were injured because of the photos.” She also apologized to “detainees, the families, America and all the soldiers.”

England, of Fort Ashby, W.Va., was convicted Monday of one count of conspiracy, four counts of mistreating detainees, and one count of committing an indecent act for her role in the sexual abuse and humiliation of the detainees. She was acquitted on a second conspiracy count.

She was the last of nine low-level reservists involved in the scandal either to be convicted or to accept plea bargains. No officers have gone to trial.

The maximum sentence England could have received was nine years in a military prison. Her attorney, Capt. Jonathan Crisp, argued that the “poisonous environment” that prevailed at Abu Ghraib dictated that England should be given a light sentence. During the hearing, Stjepan Mestrovic, a sociology professor at Texas A&M; University and an expert witness for the defense, told the jury that officers “knew or should have known what was going on” at the prison.

His assertion was supported by Spc. Charles A. Graner Jr., the reputed ringleader of the reservists at the center of the allegations of abuse, who was brought to the court from the military prison where he is serving a 10-year sentence.

Graner, whom England has identified as the father of her 11-month-old son, testified that the overnight shift at the high-security prison lacked supervision.

England said she did not realize at the time that she was being “used” by Graner, whom she described as “very charming [and] funny.... He made me feel good about myself.”

“I trusted him and I loved him,” she said.

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Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.