Video: Bales to face murder charges

>> government officials say a short time from now the u.s. soldier accused of shooting and killing 17 afghan civilians will be formally charged with murder. army staff sergeant robert bales is expected to be charged with 17 counts of murder as well as lesser charges of attempted murder and aggravated assault. the lawyer representing bales said the government will have trouble proving this case because there is no crime scene . john yang is there where bales is being held inside a maximum security cell. as we look at the charges collecoming down, what kind of charges will he be facing?

>> military experts, justice experts say this will undoubtedly carry the death penalty . we won't know that for a little while the way the military justice system works. we get the preliminary charges and then an article 32 investigation, a grand jury investigation. that's when they decide, or they recommend the specific charges to, that bales will be tried on. that's when they'll say specifically whether or not this will be a death penalty case. that triggers all sorts of new sort of levels of judgment in this case. the military system does not bring a lot of death penalty cases. the last execution was in 1961 . and currently on the maximum security prison here at ft. leavenworth, there are six people on death row . it is so rare, they don't have the equipment to carry out an execution. if someone were to be executed. they have to be taken to the federal penitentiary in indiana.

>> have people been about, especially what we've learned, that bales' lawyer said his client has these memories problems that stem from a concussion predating these attacks. there is this lack of physical evidence , and the fingerprints, the crime scene basically, that can't be investigated. what are government officials saying about that?

>> well, they are obviously skeptical, number one, of the allegations that he had some sort of concussive head injury in a vehicle accident. they say there is no record of that. they say on brown's contention that there is no physical evidence , there is no forensic evidence , they say that they have shell casings that were apparently, they say have been determined to have been fired from staff sergeant bales' weapon. they do not have, they admit, access to the bodies of the dead. but as we're learning through these charges, he is facing six charges of attempted murder . so that there are six afghan villagers who were wounded by staff sergeant bales and conceivably could testify that it was staff sergeant bales who assaulted them. thomas?

Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/newsnation/46837032/

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