Soldier sentenced in slaying of fellow Iraq vet

Soldier sentenced in slaying of fellow Iraq vet

By P. Solomon Banda - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Nov 3, 2008 21:44:42 EST

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — A soldier who pleaded guilty in the shooting death of a fellow Iraq veteran apologized to the victim’s family in court Monday and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Kenneth Eastridge, 24, pleaded guilty in July to accessory to murder in the death of Kevin Shields. Shields’ family said he had just learned his wife was pregnant and had gone to a nightclub to celebrate when he was killed on Dec. 1, his birthday. While there, he met up with Eastridge and Louis Bressler, two soldiers he met while serving in Iraq.

Prosecutors said Bressler killed Shields after the two of them fought in a park and Eastridge later helped get rid of evidence.

“I don’t have the right to ask for forgiveness but I just hope that everybody knows someday that I really am sorry,” Eastridge said, visibly shaking as he read his statement from a podium in the courtroom.

“I believe he loved his family,” said Eastridge, who was wearing an orange jail suit and had a tattoo on one arm of a double lightning bolt, a neo-Nazi symbol. “I really didn’t know him that well but he spoke a lot about his wife and his kids .... I had no idea that Kevin was going to be killed.”

Outside the courtroom, Shields’ mother, Debra Shields of Loves Park, Ill., held her son’s dog tags and tearfully said it was the first time any of the three defendants had shown any remorse.

McAteer said that during two tours in Iraq, Eastridge manned a machine gun on top of a Humvee and saw “more battles and bloodshed as a 19-year-old than most will ever see in a lifetime.”

She said he suffered a serious head injury when a roadside bomb struck his Humvee during his first tour, tossing him 30 to 60 feet. She said a pre-sentence report found Eastridge suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, and she blamed the military for discharging him without medical help.
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