'Marine A' Will Find Out Appeal Result On Wednesday

A Royal Marine who shot an injured Taliban fighter in Afghanistan will find out the result of an appeal against his murder conviction on Wednesday.

Five judges at the Court Martial Appeal Court in London are to announce their decision at 10.30am in a challenge brought by Sergeant Alexander Blackman.

They have heard argument that fresh psychiatric evidence would have provided Blackman, 42, from Taunton in Somerset, with a diminished responsibility defence.

The panel of judges, headed by Lord Chief Justice Lord Thomas, have been urged to overturn the "unsafe" murder conviction on the basis of "uncontradicted" evidence from three distinguished psychiatrists that Blackman was suffering from a mental illness - an adjustment disorder - at the time of the killing.

If Blackman wins and the conviction is reduced to manslaughter, the issue of what sentence should be imposed will be dealt with at a further hearing.

Blackman's QC Jonathan Goldberg said at a hearing in February that the key "stressors" were his perception of poor leadership above him, isolation, a family history of depression, an earlier near-fatal grenade attack and the death of a colleague he had mentored.

His disorder substantially impaired his ability to form a rational judgment or exercise self-control and this would have affected his ability to know whether the insurgent was alive or not.

Richard Whittam QC, for the Crown, said there was no evidence to the contrary about Blackman having an adjustment disorder but the issue was "did it cause what happened".

"One has to assess the breadth of the disorder and the effect it was having."

Blackman was convicted in November 2013 by a court martial in Bulford, Wiltshire, and sentenced to life with a minimum term of 10 years.

In May 2014, the Court Martial Appeal Court rejected a conviction challenge but reduced the minimum term to eight years because of the combat stress disorder he was suffering from.

During his trial, Blackman, who denied murder and was known at that stage as Marine A, said he believed the victim was already dead and he was taking out his anger on a corpse.

The five judges heard that at the time of the 2011 incident, Blackman was serving with Plymouth-based 42 Commando in Helmand province in "ghastly" conditions which were a "breeding ground" for mental health problems.

Blackman shot the insurgent, who had been seriously injured in an attack by an Apache helicopter, in the chest at close range with a 9mm pistol before quoting a phrase from Shakespeare as the man convulsed and died in front of him.

He told him:

"There you are. Shuffle off this mortal coil, you c***. It's nothing you wouldn't do to us."

He then turned to his comrades and said: "Obviously this doesn't go anywhere, fellas. I just broke the Geneva Convention."

The shooting was captured on a camera mounted on the helmet of another Royal Marine.

He was "dismissed with disgrace" from the Royal Marines after serving with distinction for 15 years, including tours of Iraq, Afghanistan and Northern Ireland.

Blackman's case was referred to the appeal court by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), an independent body that investigates possible miscarriages of justice.