Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales (L) and Judge Col. Jeffery R. Nance are seen in a sketch from January 17, 2013, as Bales is arraigned on 16 counts of premeditated murder, six counts of attempted murder and seven of assault at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington. REUTERS/Peter Millett/Files
TACOMA, Washington (Reuters) - A U.S. Army sergeant who killed 16 Afghan civilians in cold blood last year pleaded guilty on Wednesday to premeditated murder and other charges under a deal with military prosecutors that spares him from the death penalty.
Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, a decorated veteran of four combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, admitted to leaving his Army post in the Afghan province of Kandahar last March to gun down and set fire to unarmed villagers, mostly women and children, in attacks on their family compounds.
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