By Bob McCarty and Carrie Fatigante

It’s not uncommon for people convicted of crimes to proclaim their innocence. Most deserve to be ignored, but not Army Ranger 1st Lt. Michael Behenna.

On July 31, 2008, Lieutenant Behenna was charged with the premeditated murder of Ali Mansur, a known Al-Qaeda operative operating in the area of Albu Toma, north of Baghdad. Seven months later, the 26 -year-old leader of the 18-member Delta Company, 5th platoon of the Army 101st Airborne Infantry Division, was sentenced to 25 years confinement at Fort Leavenworth after being convicted by a military court-martial panel of unpremeditated murder in violation of Article 118 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Though a judge later reduced his sentence to 20 years, the Edmond, Okla., native remains confined at the U.S. Army Garrison in the middle of Kansas, largely due to the fact that a forensics expert whose testimony likely would have exonerated him was never allowed to be heard during the court-martial.

That forensics expert, Dr. Herbert Leon MacDonell, is director of the Laboratory of Forensic Science in Corning, N.Y. During a career spanning five decades, he’s been involved in such high-profile cases as the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., and the 1994 double-murder case involving O.J. Simpson. In this case, he appears to harbor strong feelings about the evidence — the kind of feelings that might lead anyone who doesn’t earn an income as an expert witness to say he believes Lieutenant Behenna is innocent.

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In recent years, I’ve published too many posts about members of the Armed Forces facing undeserved charges:

• First, it was the so-called “Haditha Marines” who faced trumped-up charges, thanks largely to idiots like Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) declaring them guilty before a mainstream media eager to paint them in a bad light.

• Next, it was Army Ranger 1st Lt. Michael Behenna who was wrongly convicted of executing an Iraqi detainee, Ali Mansur, on May 16, 2008, and is now serving a 25-year sentence at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.

• Now, I’m following the case of three Navy SEALs facing assault charges related to their capture of Ahmed Hashim Abed.  Who is Abed?  He’s the alleged planner of the March 2004 ambush, killing and mutilation of four Blackwater contractors in Fallujah, Iraq.  The SEALS gave this enemy combatant piece of dirt a fat lip while apprehending him.

As my first investigative reporting effort related to the SEALs’ case, I offer six important facts about the case you’re likely not to read about in the mainstream media supplied to me by a source whom I cannot name inside the Pentagon:

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