Accused Afghan shooter claims PTSD symptoms

The Lewis-McChord sergeant accused of killing 17 Afghan
civilians never told his wife he was having PTSD-related
symptoms, but he has told his attorney he’s been suffering
for years.

Staff Sergeant Robert Bales told defense attorney John
Henry Browne that he has suffered from intense dreams,
nightmares, night sweats and flashbacks since his three
tours in Iraq.

The
Washington Post reports Bales did tell his wife Kari
that he was suffering persistent headaches, but that was
it.

Just last week, Kari Bales told NBC’s Today Show that her
husband didn’t suffer from nightmares or bad dreams, but
she admitted “he shielded me from a lot of what he went
through.”

Bales also told his attorney that he had two sips of
alcohol the night of the attack. It was smuggled into the
remote base by a special forces soldier in a Gatorade
bottle.

Bales has had incidents involving alcohol and violence in
the past.

In 2002, he was arrested for a drunken assault of a
security guard at a Tacoma casino. That charge was
dismissed after Bales completed 20 hours of anger
management training.

In 2008, a couple accused an intoxicated Bales of grabbing
a woman’s hand and thrusting it toward his crotch before
kicking and punching the woman’s boyfriend, according to a
police report. Prosecutors declined to pursue that case.

A defense team is now in Afghanistan to collect evidence
and interview other U.S. soldiers who knew Bales.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.