Court Martial Proceedings for Sgt. Bergdahl Set for Tuesday on Fort Bragg

Col. Christopher Frederikson, the judge in the case, explained that if Bergdahl opted against a bench trial, he would face a panel of at least five officers, all ranked higher than the sergeant. Bergdahl spoke few words in response to the questions during that time, and mostly responded saying, “Sir, yes sir”.

“The accused wishes to defer for reflection”, Bergdahl’s attorney, Lt. Col. Franklin Rosenblatt said, according to Reuters.

While the military typically follows the recommendation from the preliminary hearing, it’s not unheard of for a high-ranking general to make a different decision, said Walter Huffman, a retired major general who was the Army’s top lawyer. However, the Pentagon has said that it has no proof that anyone died amid search efforts for Bergdahl.

The next court date is scheduled for January 12.

Army Colonel Jeffery Nance has been assigned as the judge in Bergdahl’s case.

If convicted at a general court-martial, Bergdahl could get up to five years for desertion and life in prison on the misbehavior charge.

In 2009, an American soldier, Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, disappeared from his base in the Paktika province of Afghanistan and was captured by the Taliban.

Parents… President Barack Obama with Bowe Bergdahl’s parents, Jani Bergdahl, left, and Bob Bergdahl, at a White House press conference in 2014. He returned to the United States two weeks later.

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

The Idaho native’s 25 hours of conversations with screenwriter Mark Boal is the basis for the second season of the podcast, hosted by journalist Sarah Koenig. “That was basically how they treated me”.

During his brief arraignment hearing at Fort Bragg in North Carolina on Tuesday, Bergdahl deferred offering a plea in what was his first court appearance pertaining to charges that could carry a life sentence in prison.

Instead, he said, Taliban fighters on motorcycles, armed with AK-47s, found him walking along a desert road and took him captive.

Bergdahl was charged earlier this year with desertion and endangering USA troops.