[media-credit id=1 align=”aligncenter” width=”300″]
[/media-credit]BY ALINE REYNOLDS | Community advocates and elected officials involved in the Danny Chen case have scored a major victory by helping to persuade the U.S. Army to hold the trials of eight soldiers implicated in the soldier’s apparent suicide on U.S. soil.
Last week, Army officials announced that the courts-martial, which were scheduled to begin earlier this month at Kandahar Airfield in Afghanistan, will instead be administered at the Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina. The military’s decision about the trials’ locale follows months of petitioning by the New York chapter of the Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA-NY) to have the trials moved to the U.S.
“This is a welcome victory for the community and the family,” said OCA-NY President Elizabeth OuYang at an April 12 press conference at the organization’s Chinatown offices. “It’ll be easier for our community to get there, and it’ll be easier for the family to get there. The family deserves to be there, and the public needs to see what’s going on, in order for there to be legitimacy to this process.”
Making the courts-martial accessible to Chen’s parents and other relatives is one of the main reasons why the Army decided to hold them on U.S. turf, according to Colonel Kevin Arata, chief public affairs officer at Fort Bragg. The Army had previously advised the family against traveling to Afghanistan for the trials for safety reasons.
Another factor was that Chen’s unit is being redeployed back to America this week, Arata noted. Holding the trials in Afghanistan, therefore, “would involve keeping people deployed [overseas] for more than one year, which is not congruent with our timeline,” he said.
Chen’s grieving parents were comforted by the news.
“When she heard the news, her heart felt so much better,” said Council Member Margaret Chin, translating for Chen’s mother, Su Zhen Chen. “She wants to make sure they bring the eight people back to the U.S. so she could see the trials.”
Chin expressed her own thoughts, saying, “I hope that from now on, we can help heal her heart. Together, we got the Army to listen… In North Carolina, the parents will be able to look at these eight people in the face, in their eye, and ask them, ‘Why, why did you do that to Danny?’ And hopefully we’ll get justice.”
U.S. Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez also praised the Army’s decision, particularly since the Army wasn’t forthcoming in the weeks after Chen’s death. Velazquez vowed to continue fighting along with the community against the wrongdoings tied to Chen’s death.
“I’m so proud of the Asian community for coming together and forcing the army to take a hard look as to how we put in place measures that will prevent another death to take place among our soldiers,” said Velazquez. “This is the best reassurance that we can give to any mother or father who confronts the reality that one of their children might be joining the army.”
Last October, Chen, a 19-year-old native of Chinatown, was found lifeless in a guard tower in Kandahar, Afghanistan, with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Kandahar is where Chen’s unit has been stationed since last summer.
It wasn’t immediately clear exactly when the court-martials would begin. The trial of 25-year-old Army Sergeant Travis Carden, charged with having assaulted and recklessly endangered Chen, was supposed to start in Afghanistan on April 4. However, due to the change of venue, the trial has been delayed, and the charges against Carden that were recommended by Major General James L. Huggins, Jr., the Afghanistan-based Staff Judge Advocate, have been transferred to Fort Bragg. According to the military, the process is following normal protocol.
As of Mon., April 16, none of the eight cases had been referred to courts-martial, according to Col. Runo Richardson, an attorney from Fort Bragg’s Staff Judge Advocate’s office. Using the evidence presented to them, the S.J.A. attorneys are charged with recommending by the month’s end which of the eight soldiers’ charges should be referred to the courts-martial, Richardson said. Lieutenant General Frank Helmick, representing the Court-Martial Convening Authority, will then make a final decision on the referral of charges, based on the attorneys’ recommendation.
“If charges are referred,” Richardson said, “the accused will be arraigned, and their cases will be scheduled for trial.”
Another locale previously under consideration for the Chen trials was Fort Wainwright, Alaska, the home base of Chen’s military unit. But holding the trials at Fort Bragg, one of the military’s largest domestic installations, ultimately made more sense, according to Arata.
“The bottom line is resources,” said Arata, noting that Fort Bragg has ample facilities, including courtrooms and hotels, to accommodate the trials and their participants. Fort Bragg also has a pool of approximately 56,000 soldiers to choose from in appointing members for its panel, the courts-martial equivalent of a jury, as well as a plethora of judges to arbitrate the cases.
“We have the ability to pull a lot of support from there,” said Arata. “We also have a large pool of people within our post for both the prosecuting and defense trial counsel.”
The Army cannot predict how long the trials will last. An attorney representing Chen’s family told OuYang that the military is expected to complete the trials in seven months, but Arata said that this time frame might be wishful thinking.
“Putting us down for a specific [end] date would be kind of dangerous, since we haven’t referred charges yet,” said Arata, noting that unforeseen snags could potentially stall the judicial process. “The important thing from our end is going through the correct court procedures to make sure we do it right.”
Continuing the fight for justice
Chen’s family, OCA-NY and elected officials continue to pressure the Army to pass on all of the soldiers’ initial charges to the courts-martial, including involuntary manslaughter, which carries a 10-year prison sentence, and negligent homicide, which carries a maximum sentence of three years.
Following last week’s press conference, OuYang resent the petition advocating the cause to Major General James L. Huggins, Jr., in Afghanistan. Some 2,400 people from around the globe, including Malaysia, Vietnam and Europe, have signed the petition in just the last month, OuYang said, bringing the total signature count to 3,600.
“The family and community has every expectation they will be referred to the court-martial,” said OuYang. “They need to be tried to the fullest extent of the law.”
To commemorate Danny’s 20th birthday, which is on May 26, OCA-NY is organizing an arts performance at Pace University High School featuring artists including R&B singer Taiyo, photographer Corky Lee, and spoken word artist Kris Lew, among others. OuYang anticipates a large turnout for the event, scheduled for Thurs., May 24.
OCA-NY is also sponsoring a birthday card campaign for Chen, with the goal of collecting 10,000 cards and hand-delivering them next month to the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee in Washington, D.C.
“The fight for justice is far from over, and we need your help with the next step,” reads a template created by OCA-NY available to card-writers.
Alternatively, people may make their own cards or submit a message online at www.justicefordannychen.tumblr.com/submit.
The cards are due by Mon., May 14. Participants making their own cards are asked to send them to OCA-NY, P.O. Box 3233, Church Street Station, New York N.Y. 10018.
