• Miracle baby of the Aurora tragedy

    University of Colorado Hospital

    Baby Hugo was born at 7:11 a.m. local time on Tuesday.

    Kate Snow writes

      
    AURORA, Colo. – He’s the tiny miracle after the tragedy of Aurora. 

    Hugo Jackson Medley was born at 7:11 a.m. local time on Tuesday, according to University of Colorado Hospital spokesman Dan Weaver. Both mother and child are doing well.

    His mother, Katie Medley, escaped the Colorado movie theater attack uninjured, but her husband, Caleb, is in the same hospital in a medically-induced coma fighting for his life. 

    High school sweethearts
    High school sweethearts, Katie and Caleb Medley started dating during their senior year in the small town of Florence, Colo., according to their close friend Michael West, who has become their family spokesman.  

    “You could just tell that out of everyone in the world, these two were meant for each other,” West wrote on a website dedicated to Caleb that he created to raise money to cover his friend’s medical bills.  As of Tuesday afternoon, the website has had 2,600 donors who have given about $90,000.   

    TODAY

    Katie Medley, who was nine-months pregnant when she was at the movie theater where the Aurora shooting happened, delivered her son, Hugo, on Tuesday morning. Her husband, Caleb, right, is in critical condition in the hospital from gun shot wounds sustained during the attack.

    In eighth grade, Caleb, now 23, decided he wanted to be a standup comedian. So after he and Katie, 21, got married they moved to Denver, where he could chase his dream.

    In an Internet video titled “Caleb Saves the Internet: Saving the One Nighter,” he chronicles life on the road as a struggling comic.
    He jokes about staying in a seedy motel room with a busted deadbolt and stains on the wall. But Caleb was making progress. Last Wednesday night, he performed stand up at the New Faces Contest at Comedy Works South in Denver, according to the Denver Post. He did well enough to advance to the next round of a comedy festival. 

    It was to be a big week for the couple. Not only was Caleb getting comedy gigs, but he was about to become a father. Katie, a veterinary student, was nine months pregnant and her doctor planned to induce labor on Monday, July 23.

    One last date night
    Katie and Caleb decided to treat themselves to one last night out before they needed a babysitter. Even though she was nine months pregnant, they were huge Batman fans and they were not going to miss opening night.

    NBC's Kate Snow reports on the shooting suspects court appearance Monday, as well as the status of some of the shooting victims, including Caleb Medley.

    "They had Batman apparel on. They waited for this movie for over a year,” said David Sanchez, Katie Medley’s father. 

    “They were having the normal opening night movie experience,” their friend Michael West wrote, recounting a conversation he had with Katie.  “They stood anxiously in line, spent too much on popcorn and soda, suffered through the movie trailers and watched the beginning of the movie. That is when evil struck.”

    “I thought it was a prank at first or someone playing along with the movie,” Katie told him, West writes. “Then he opened fire.”

    Caleb was shot in the face. He was put in the back of a police cruiser and driven to University of Colorado hospital. The website says he has lost his right eye, suffered brain damage and is in a medically-induced coma.

    Katie’s father, Sanchez, was at the Arapahoe County courthouse Monday to see the man he blames for ruining what was supposed to be a joyous time for the family. He said his daughter had asked him to come since she was in no state to attend herself.

    “When it’s your own daughter and she escaped death by just mere seconds, I would say, it really makes you angry,” he told a group of reporters outside the courthouse where the shooting suspect James Eagan Holmes made a brief appearance Monday.  

    Asked about his son-in-law, Caleb, he said, “He's in critical but stable condition, so we're praying for him. I think the main concern is him right now, and the baby being born.” 

    Like many of the young 20-somethings at the movies that terrible night, the Medleys have no health insurance, according to their friend West. 

    “Caleb and his family have no insurance, and these hospital bills are going to be well into the hundreds if not thousands if not millions. Caleb and Katie will be struggling with these hospital bills for the rest of their lives,” West wrote on the website.

    In two remarkable stories of survival, one woman saves the life of her best friend, and a father protects his son's girlfriend after she was badly wounded. NBC's Miguel Almaguer reports.

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  • For alleged Afghan shooter, death penalty unlikely

    The defense attorney for Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, the soldier charged Friday with 17 counts of murder, has said the military lacks much of the physical evidence necessary to establish a solid case against his client. But prosecutors say there is ample evidence: surveillance video, shell casings and more. NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reports.

    John Yang writes
    FORT LEAVENWORTH, Kan. –   The charges against Staff Sgt. Robert Bales for the premeditated murder of 17 Afghan civilians include the possibility of a death sentence. But, analysts say, the chances of a death sentence actually being imposed are not high.


    “We don’t have a particularly bloodthirsty military justice program,” said Eugene Fidell, the co-founder of the National Institute of Military Justice who teaches at Yale Law School.

    Staff Sgt. Robert Bales charged with 17 counts of murder in Afghanistan massacre

    There are currently six men on death row in the military’s only maximum security prison -- euphemistically called the “Disciplinary Barracks” -- here on Fort Leavenworth. But the last execution was carried out in 1961, when an Army ammunition handler was hanged there for raping an 11-year-old girl in Austria.

    It’s been so long, in fact, that the military prison no longer has the equipment needed to execute a prisoner. Instead, the sentence would be carried out at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind., where Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was executed. The current method is lethal injection; the Leavenworth military prison had an electric chair when that was the method, but it was never used.

    Women are going online to show their compassion for the wife of the Army staff sergeant who has been charged with 17 counts of murder. NBC's Miguel Almaguer reports.

    None of those currently on death row were convicted of crimes on the battlefield against foreign civilians; all were convicted of murders of U.S. civilians or fellow military personnel.

    Death toll in Afghanistan massacre climbs to 17

    The next step in the process is what’s called an Article 32 investigation, which will determine if the case should go to trial (which would be a court martial), and if so, what specific charges should be brought (they can be different from the charges originally filed), and if they should carry the possibility of the death penalty.

    Analysts say that process will not be quick.

    “I would expect that in a complicated case like this, it would be several months before we would see an Article 32 investigation,” said Victor Hansen, a retired Army lawyer who now teaches at New England Law in Boston. “There’s a lot of investigation the government has yet to do.”

    Retired Army Colonel and NBC military analyst Jack Jacobs examines the concerns set forth by the attorney for Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, the soldier who was charged Friday with 17 counts of murder.

    If this becomes a death penalty case, there would have to be 12 jury members, and their guilty verdict would have to be unanimous for it to result in an execution. In other cases, as few as five jurors are required and a two-thirds vote can convict.

    “If you have a capital case, we don’t cut corners,” said the Yale Law School’s Fidell.

    PTSD: Having the courage to ask for help

    And because Bales is an enlisted man, he could request that enlisted personnel make up at least a third of the 12 considering his fate.

    Even though Bales is being held at Fort Leavenworth, proceedings may not necessarily be held here. A leading contender for the trial venue is Joint Base Lewis-McChord outside Seattle, where Bales is based and near where his wife and two small children live.

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  • Interactions limited to guards and chaplain for alleged Afghan shooter at Ft. Leavenworth

    John Henry Browne, the lawyer for Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, questioned the military's case against his client. NBC's John Yang reports.

    John Yang, NBC News correspondent writes

    FORT LEAVENWORTH, Kan. – Wake up, 5 a.m.; breakfast, 5:15 a.m.; clean-up chores, 6:50 a.m. until 11:20 a.m., and so on until lights out at 10:05 p.m.

    That’s Staff Sgt. Robert Bales’ daily routine in a medium/minimum security pre-trial detention facility in a remote corner of this sprawling 5,600-acre Army post. Bales is the American soldier accused of massacring 16 civilians in southern Afghanistan. His lawyer, John Henry Browne, says the 17-month-old facility is cleaner than many civilian prisons he’s seen.

    For Bales, it’s a relatively lonely existence. He’s in a special cell by himself – solitary confinement – not the usual four-prisoner bays. He’s made use of the recreation facilities, according to prison officials, and has met with the prison chaplain, according to Browne.

    Like all new inmates, he’s in a black-out period of about a week while he’s processed and classified – no access to phones or e-mail. Later he will have access to email, that will be monitored by authorities, but not Internet access, according to his lawyer. And he will be able to keep books, newspapers and magazines.

    Browne says Army officials are working to make an exception for Bales so he may speak with his wife, Karilyn, by phone; their only contact since he was arrested March 12 was a 30-minute phone conversation when he was held in Kuwait. They are also arranging for Karilyn Bales to travel from Seattle to see her husband for the first time since he left for Afghanistan in December.

    The 464-bed facility also houses military convicts sentenced to up to five years of imprisonment. But the two populations are kept apart, according to Browne, Bales’ interactions are currently limited to guards and the chaplain. 

    John Henry Browne, the attorney for U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, speaks about the long and emotional first face-to-face meeting with his client.  NBC's John Yang reports.

    Interestingly, the facility holds a few other noteworthy pre-trail detainees – including PFC Bradley Manning, accused of giving classified documents to Wikileaks. 

    Browne, who’s previous clients include serial killer Ted Bundy, said his 11 hours with Bales were some of the most emotional he’s ever spent, as his client described his three deployments to Iraq and the three months in Afghanistan leading up to the shooting rampage.

    “He's dragged pieces of bodies all over the place and had people shot out from right next to him,” Browne told NBC News. “Things that are hard to imagine.... If you saw the movie ‘The Hurt Locker,’ well, that's like a Disney movie compared to what he's gone through,” he said, referring to the Academy Award-winning film about a bomb disposal unit in Iraq.

    Contrary to reports from villagers where the massacre took place, U.S. military officials say there is no evidence of an IED attack on Americans around the time of the shooting that killed 16 Afghan civilians. NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reports.

    It was Browne and Bales’ first face-to-face meeting; all previous conversations were by phone. Bales’ first questions to him, according to Browne?  “‘How are the boys on the ground? How are my buddies? I'm really worried about them. I'm really worried that this allegation will make their lives more difficult.’” And all of the rest of the questions were about his family. Not once did he ask about his own plight, according to Browne.

    “If I was in a life threatening situation, I would want him next to me,” Browne said. 

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  • Officials: US soldier in Afghanistan shooting spree said 'I did it'

    Villagers who witnessed the methodical killing are asking for an execution and the U.S. is reportedly considering charges that would carry the death penalty for the soldier who allegedly killed 16 Afghan civilians. NBC's Richard Engel reports.

    Jim Miklaszewski, NBC News chief Pentagon correspondent writes

    Defense officials have told NBC News that the Army staff sergeant who allegedly shot and killed 16 Afghan civilians, including nine children, admitted his actions to fellow soldiers just before he was taken into custody.

    "I did it," he is said to have told them.

    According to the officials, a search party that included helicopters was formed after an Afghan soldier reported the American had left their small remote outpost in the early morning hours. In the meantime, the base received word that a number of civilians had been killed in a shooting spree at a nearby village.

    Overhead surveillance first spotted the soldier on his stomach in a field, either attempting to hide or crawl toward the base.  He eventually stood up and walked a short distance to the base where he was confronted and asked about the shootings at the village.  The officials say the staff sergeant replied "I did it."  At that point he was disarmed and taken into custody.  He then asked for a lawyer and has refused to talk ever since.

     

    The officials also said they’ve received reports that the soldier was having marital problems and had recently received a troubling letter or email from his wife. According to one official, after four combat deployments it’s not unusual there would be stress on the family.

    Defense officials also told NBC News that investigators have reason to believe that alcohol "may" have been a contributing factor in the shooting spree.

    The investigation found bottles of alcohol on the small remote base where the staff sergeant was deployed.  The officials emphasize "may" because they say that nowhere in the reporting from the field is there any indication the staff sergeant was inebriated.

    The soldier, reportedly married with two children, enlisted in the Army soon after the terror attacks of Sept. 11 and did three combat tours in Iraq before arriving in Kandahar, near where the shootings took place, in December 2011.

    US soldier accused in Afghan massacre had brain injury history

    Reports that the soldier had received post-traumatic stress disorder examinations are not unusual, since every soldier coming out of combat is routinely screened for PTSD.

    The soldier suffered some minor traumatic brain injury in a rollover in Iraq in 2010, but that part of his medical history does not appear at this point to be a factor, according to the officials. They also said the man has a clean medical and behavior record.

    Obama: Killing Afghans as serious as killing Americans

    Col. Gary Kolb, a spokesman for the U.S.-led military coalition in Kabul, told The Associated Press a 48-hour probable cause assessment has been completed and that the service member continues to be confined.

    Additionally, the officials told NBC News that the the military is considering capital murder charges against the soldier, meaning he could face the death penalty if convicted. They said the military also intends to conduct his court martial hearing in Afghanistan. Not only would it send the right signal to the Afghan people, officials said, but trying him in the United States or another country in the region would also present a logistics nightmare given the number of witnesses that would be expected to testify.

    Military investigators in Afghanistan hope to file charges and release the identity of the soldier by the end of the week, but warn it could take another two weeks.

    The Associated Press contributed to this report.

    On Joint Base Lewis-McChord, where the soldier suspected of shooting 16 Afghan civilians came from, the military had previously launched an investigation into the military installation's health care system after nearly 300 soldiers had their PTSD diagnoses reversed. NBC's Miguel Almaguer reports.

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