Skip to content
Guest Thinkers

Blackwater Shame

Two defense contractors have been charged with shooting and killing two Afghan citizens in Kabul and wounding a third, prosecutors said on Thursday.
Sign up for Smart Faster newsletter
The most counterintuitive, surprising, and impactful new stories delivered to your inbox every Thursday.

Two defense contractors, working for a subsidiary of Blackwater Worldwide, have been charged with shooting and killing two Afghan citizens in Kabul and wounding a third, prosecutors said on Thursday. “Justin Cannon, 27, and Christopher Drotleff, 29, were indicted by a federal grand jury in Norfolk on murder and other charges in the May 5 shootings, in which the men opened fire with AK-47 assault rifles on a car that they said they thought was trying to run them down. The indictment was unsealed Thursday. At the time of the shootings, the men were Pentagon contractors employed by Paravant LLC, a Blackwater subsidiary that specializes in firearms training. They were in Afghanistan to train that country’s army in using and maintaining weapons systems and were transporting two Afghan translators at the time of the incident, their attorney said.”

Sign up for Smart Faster newsletter
The most counterintuitive, surprising, and impactful new stories delivered to your inbox every Thursday.

Related

Up Next
Officials are warning that the World Cup in South Africa could be a public health disaster with half the nation’s prostitutes carrying HIV and half a million football fans expected in the region.