(Paging Jack Murtha, Paging Jack Murtha)

Reuters reports:

The U.S. Marines have dismissed charges against one of the officers accused of dereliction of duty for failing to report accurately the U.S. killing of 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha in 2005.

He’s agreed to apparently assist in the remainder of the case for prosecutions, but only one Marine actually continues to have charges against him for murder. The others have charges for failing to follow procedure (ie. reporting it correctly to command).

Remember, though:

REP. JOHN “JACK” MURTHA: Well, I’ll tell you exactly what happened. One Marine was killed and the Marines just said we’re going to take care – we don’t know who the enemy is, the pressure was too much on them, so they went into houses and they actually killed civilians. And, and –

MATTHEWS:—was this My Lai? Was this a case of – when you say cold blood Congressman, a lot of people think you’re basically saying you got some civilians sitting in a room around a field and they’re executed.

MURTHA: That’s exactly it.