Marine response to Haditha was negligent

The NYTimes has a front page story on this, but notice that it was "leaked" for the Friday night dump, the intentional graveyard for negative stories to get the least coverage.

WASHINGTON, July 7 — The second-ranking American commander in Iraq has concluded that some senior Marine officers were negligent in failing to investigate more aggressively the killings of 24 Iraqi civilians by marines in Haditha last November, two Defense Department officials said Friday.

The officer, Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, concluded that in the deaths, including those of 10 women and children and an elderly man in a wheelchair, senior officers failed to follow up on inaccuracies and inconsistencies in the initial reporting of the incident that should have raised questions.

(Is the Friday dump operative in the Islamic week? Are they more afraid of Americans finding out than Iraqis?)