Bergdahl to be arraigned on charges including desertion

FORT BRAGG, North Carolina (CNN) – Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was arraigned on charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy during a hearing preceding his court martial at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, on Tuesday.

During the hearing, Bergdahl wore an Army dress uniform with a dark blue jacket and trousers and had closely cropped hair, according to the AP.

The Army sergeant spent about 11 minutes in the court room, CNN reported, which held an audience of approximately 50 people, made up of mostly media and military personnel.

Bergdahl, who was held by the Taliban for five years after he walked off a base, was arraigned during a short hearing on charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy, a relatively rare charge that carries the severe punishment.

He disappeared in Afghanistan in 2009 after walking away from his post. Bergdahl has not spoken publicly since his release from the Taliban in May 2014 in a controversial exchange for the release of five senior-level Taliban detainees from Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Tuesday’s hearing is Bergdahl’s first chance to hear the charges against him and enter a plea.

Now stationed at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston, Texas, Bergdahl is assigned a clerical job with U.S. Army North.

He said Bergdahl was unrealistically idealistic, but not a Taliban sympathiser.

The surprise prisoner swap in 2014 sparked a firestorm of criticism and intrigue.

If convicted, Bergdahl could get life in prison.

Army Maj. Gen. Kenneth Dahl, who led the Bergdahl investigation, testified this year that imprisoning Bergdahl would be “inappropriate” because Dahl’s lengthy interview with the 29-year-old sergeant yielded no evidence that he was “sympathetic to the Taliban”. The charges will be read into the record by the trial counsel, or prosecutor, unless Bergdahl and his defense team waive the reading.

Bergdahl told Boal his original plan was to trek to another military base to draw attention to what he called a failure in leadership in his unit.

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“I was trying to prove to myself, I was trying to prove to the world, to anybody who used to know me …” And he wanted to prove himself as a real-life action hero, like someone out of a movie.

He said he was spotted by six men armed with AK-47s and travelling on motorcycles.

Troops were injured and killed looking for Bergdahl, Buetow said, and others in his platoon were in constant fear that Bergdahl would give up information – either voluntarily or via torture – that would endanger them.

The US Army Forces Command announced last week the charges against Bergdahl had been referred for trial by general court-martial.