Four former Blackwater security contractors found guilty in a deadly Baghdad shooting have appealed their convictions, saying a key witness against them had changed his testimony after the trial and that prosecutors lacked jurisdiction to even bring the case.
The appeals, long expected, represent the latest legal volley in a criminal case that's spanned years in Washington's federal court and that concluded with guilty verdicts following a months-long trial in 2014.
Nicholas Slatten is serving a life sentence on a charge of first-degree murder. Three other former guards -- Paul Slough, Evan Liberty and Dustin Herd -- were found guilty of manslaughter and firearms charges carrying mandatory 30-year sentences.
The case arose from the September 2007 shooting in Nisoor Square that prosecutors say left 14 civilians dead at the crowded traffic circle in downtown Baghdad. The shooting strained international relations and drew scrutiny to the role of American contractors in war-torn Iraq.
The two sides presented the jury with radically different accounts of the events: Prosecutors described the killings as a one-sided ambush of unarmed civilians, while defense lawyers said the guards opened fire only after a white Kia sedan seen as a potential car bomb threat began moving quickly toward their convoy.
Central to the appeal is a witness who defense lawyers say changed his account of what happened in a way that undermines the government's narrative.
The witness, an Iraqi traffic officer, testified that the killings were unprovoked and that the driver of the Kia was killed by the first shots that were fired.
But just before the sentencing hearing last April, the same witness submitted a statement saying that the driver of the Kia was alive when the shooting started.
The judge refused to grant the men a new trial, but the defence team said the new account dismantled the prosecution's theory.
