Good luck:
WASHINGTON — Justice Department officials have told Congress that they face serious legal difficulties in pursuing criminal prosecutions of Blackwater security guards involved in a September shooting that left at least 17 Iraqis dead.
In a private briefing in mid-December, officials from the Justice and State Departments met with aides to the House Judiciary Committee and other Congressional staff members and warned them that there were major legal obstacles that might prevent any prosecution. Justice officials were careful not to say whether any decision had been made in the matter, according to two of the Congressional staff members who received the briefing.The staff members, who asked not to be identified, disclosed details of the meeting in interviews this week.
There's a good backgrounder on the cases over at TPM.
Here's a thought: if the Iraqi judicial system was good enough to prosecute and execute Saddam Hussein, why not let them do it? Iraq is supposedly a sovereign nation, after all, and although we are almost certainly morally responsible for this, I see no reason why these cases should be means it should be pursued by our justice system. They were committed in Iraq, and the victims were Iraqis. Why not just encourage the Iraqi parliament to pass a law stripping contractors of the immunity and then allow their judicial system to take care of the rest? Isn't that what sovereign nations are supposed to do?
I mean, sure, the Bush administration would never allow this to happen, but that in and of itself should be noteworthy, shouldn't it?
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