Clint Lorance feels no malice toward fellow soldiers who helped put him in prison for murder for six years before he was pardoned by President Trump a week ago, the freedman said.
“As a leader, I’m not going to disparage those guys, because as a leader, you have to protect your subordinates, even if they hate you,” Lorance told the Washington Examiner on Friday. “And even if they don’t protect you, that’s the job.”
Nine of Lorance’s soldiers testified in 2013 that the first lieutenant ordered them to shoot at three Afghans while on deployment in 2012, killing two. Lorance maintained that he was looking out for the well-being of his men. The jury found Lorance guilty of murder. He was sentenced to 19 years in prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.
Trump pardoned Lorance on Nov. 15, when he intervened in the cases of three U.S. military members who had been accused of or convicted of war crimes.
Lorance understands why his subordinates testified against him, he said.
“They’re sitting across the table from commissioned officers, and commissioned officers are sliding a document across the table that says you’re going to prison for murder unless you testify against the new guy you don’t even know,” Lorance, 34, told the Washington Examiner.
“So for them, they’re 18 years old, they’ve never been faced with such a difficult decision,” Lorance said. “They don’t know who I am or anything about me. And so it was, I think it was a transaction for them, and that’s it. Nothing more.”
While Lorance said he bears no ill will towards his troops, he claimed he would not have testified had he been in their position.
“But, you know, everybody’s different,” he said.
Lorance was three days on the job as platoon leader when he gave the order to shoot at three men who were riding a motorcycle near the unit’s position. The platoon already had suffered casualties, including the previous platoon leader, 1st Lt. Dominic Latino, who had taken shrapnel from an improvised explosive device.
Prior to the posting, Lorance had been working in his battalion’s operations center and knew the environment was extremely dangerous, he said. He also knew that Taliban fighters had been using motorcycles to conduct suicide attacks against U.S. forces in the region.
David Gurfein, a former Marine Corps officer and CEO of United American Patriots, a nonprofit which helped fund Lorance’s defense, said that Lorance’s job was to give orders — not be popular among the men.
“This is the challenge of command,” he said. “Command is a very lonely position.”
Following the trial, forensic evidence linked the three Afghan men to bomb-making.
