Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl’s attorneys to present case at hearing

Margaret Kurz said at a hearing to determine whether Bergdahl should face a court-martial on the charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy. “Bergdahl’s matter accessible to a public, not only to you”, Mr. Fidell pronounced to Lt. Colonel Mark Visger, a Army counsel who is overseeing a hearing.

He provided simple answers to questions on whether he understood the charges and occasionally took notes during the hearing. The hearing began Thursday at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, where Bergdahl has been stationed since returning to the USA a year ago .

Captain John Billings, who was Bowe Bergdahl’s platoon leader, also spoke at the military hearing on Thursday.

The Article 32 hearing at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, where Bergdahl is based, will determine if the Idaho native will face a court-martial on charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy.

He said soldiers carrying between 60 and 100 pounds (27-45 kg) of equipment hiked through the area, moving from one assignment to another with one overriding objective – finding Bergdahl.

The prosecution’s three witnesses – commanders Bergdahl’s platoon, company and battalion – testified Thursday that his disappearance from his post in Afghanistan put a strain on their forces and put his fellow soldiers in danger.

“I think lesser men would have caved”, he said of the pressure on his soldiers at the time.

The information came to light on the first day of an Article 32 hearing, the military’s version of a preliminary trial, for Sgt. The exchange became a political issue, in part because Bergdahl was alleged to have voluntarily deserted his post in 2009. Bergdahl had created to leave his section for weeks before carrying by with it. He was a prisoner for five years before being released as part of an exchange for five Taliban commanders who were held at the United States detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Bergdahl will be court martialed. GOP front runner Donald Trump has called Bergdahl a “dirty rotten traitor” although he’s been charged with no such crime. Many Republicans and some Democrats have criticized the swap, saying it was politically motivated and contrary to the US policy of not negotiating with terrorists.

The assertion emerged during a preliminary hearing at which an Army officer will consider whether the service should court-martial Bergdahl for abandoning his unit June 30, 2009, in Paktika province.

His lead attorney, Eugene Fidell, said Bergdahl would not be testifying and that any relevant information about his capture by the Taliban is included in an extensive interview Bergdahl gave military investigators previous year .

The company commander at the time of the incident said he instructed his men to search high and low to find ‘one of their brothers’. It neglects to say in that Bergdahl’s military lawyer, LTC Franklin D. Rosenblatt, contacted Clarridge after the Fox tale in Jun., in search of more details about the timeline of events in that might be useful to Bergdahl.

“The desertion charge, which falls under Article 85 of the Uniformed Code of Military Justice, carries a maximum punishment of five years confinement, a dishonorable discharge, reduction to the rank of E-1, forfeiture of all pay and allowances”.