Green Beret Case Hearing Begins

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32072, 21 August 1969, Page 11

Green Beret Case Hearing Begins

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright)

LONG BINH, August 20.

A closed preliminary hearing of the murder charges against eight American Special Forces men was resumed today in the heavily-guarded prison stockade at the United States Army Headquarters in Vietnam.

The eight men—the former Green Beret commander, Colonel Robert Rheault, two majors, three captains, a warrant officer and a sergeant—are charged with premeditated murder and with conspiracy to commit murder in the alleged shooting of a Vietnamese national, reported to have been a double-agent. The man is said to have been killed on June 20 near the coastal town of Nha Trang, which houses the headquarters of the 3000 United States Special Forces in South Vietnam, who take their name, “Green Berets,” from their distinctive headwear. All eight accused were present at today’s hearing, which will decide whether the men will face court-martial. Civilian and military defence lawyers were also at the proceedings. The accused were released on Sunday from 29 days solitary confinement in small maximum security cells inside the Long Binh prison, 18 miles north-east of Saigoa; and today they were escorted to the preliminary hearing from their more comfortable

quarters in the Long Binh Army camp outside the stockade. Pressmen and photographers were barred from the stockade, which is surrounded by an Bft high barbed-wire fence covered by canvas to prevent people from seeing in Two civilian defence lawyers for four of the accused say that the United States Army has produced no evidence to support the charges, and that they expect the investigating office to recommend that the charges be dropped. The United States Secretary of the Army (Mr Stanley Resor) is expected to arrive in Vietnam on a routine visit later this week. The Pentagon said in Washington that he would look into the case, and that he has sent two legal officers to report to him on the investigation.