Update: SSGT Pogany believes he's being pressured to quit and experts say someone should have recognized he needed help.

*****************

As we've previously reported, the cowardice charges filed against SSGT Pogany, the soldier who asked for counseling after seeing a dead Iraqi lying on the ground whose body was cut in half, have been dropped and a lesser charge of dereliction of duty has been lodged in its place.

Former Navy JAG officer and blogger Len Clevelin (Musings of a Philosophical Scrivener) examines the old charge and the new charge and thinks the Army will have a tough time proving the new one.

First, the Army is going to have to allege and prove the specific duties that SSGT Pogany is alleged to have been derelict in the performance of. Getting around that, the critical issue at trial seems to me to be whether SSGT Pogany was derelict in the performance of those duties either willfully, or through culpable negligence. The facts of the case, as presented in the media up to this time, seem to be clear that SSGT Pogany went to his chain of command and informed them that, due to the psychological trauma of seeing the severely mutilated body of the dead Iraqi, he felt that he was no longer capable of doing his duties without psychological assistance. I don't see how the Army can prove that this is either willful refusal to perform (assuming that SSGT Pogany isn't malingering (which is another offense under the UCMJ) as he has no control over his psychological reaction to seeing the horribly mutilated corpse of an enemy combatant), or "culpably negligent" (since it's clear to me under general principles of criminal liability that psychological factors interfering with one's ability to perform one's duty in no way rise to the level of "culpable negligence").

Clevelin hedges his bets somewhat, so go over and read the whole thing.

[link via Democratic Veteran]