GI pays to be shot to avoid Iraq
Wed, 19 Sep 2007 07:08:12
Source: Reuters
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=23704
A US soldier has been sentenced to one-year imprisonment for paying someone to
shoot him in the leg and avoid being redeployed to Iraq.
Jonathan Aponte, 20, spent his first tour of duty in Iraq as a supply clerk on a
military base and was never involved in combat, officials said.
Aponte was shot in the knee on July 9. Prosecutors allege that Aponte and his
then-wife paid a Bronx man USD 24, 500 to shoot him. Aponte then told police
that he had been wounded during a robbery.
But later in a plea agreement reached with prosecutors, he admitted that he had
arranged the shooting to avoid further military service in Iraq and pleaded
guilty to one misdemeanor count of falsely reporting an incident.
JS/MMN