A former Blackwater security guard was convicted of first-degree murder Wednesday for killing the first of 14 unarmed civilians in a barrage of gunfire in a crowded Baghdad traffic circle in 2007, an episode that drew international condemnation during the Iraq War.
It was the second time a federal jury in Washington convicted Nicholas A. Slatten, 35, of murder in the death of 19-year-old Ahmed Haithem Ahmed Al Rubia’y. His 2014 conviction was overturned on appeal, and a second trial last summer ended in a hung jury. Slatten now faces a mandatory life sentence without parole.
The jury foreperson told The Washington Post that jurors rejected Slatten’s claim that his convoy of guards fired on Al Rubia’y in self-defense. “In our determination, there were no justifiable deaths,” the foreperson said. “No justifiable shooting.”