Mahmudiyah rape and murders
gang-rape and killing of 14-year-old Iraqi girl Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi by US Army soldiers
The Mahmudiyah rape and murders were a series of war crimes committed by four United States Army soldiers during the U.S. occupation of Iraq, involving the gang-rape and murder of 14-year-old Iraqi girl Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi and the murder of her family on 12 March 2006. It occurred in the family's house to the southwest of Yusufiyah, a village to the west of the city of Mahmoudiyah, Iraq. Other members of al-Janabi's family murdered by U.S. soldiers include her 34-year-old mother Fakhriyah Taha Muhasen, 45-year-old father Qassim Hamza Raheem, and six-year-old sister Hadeel Qassim Hamza al-Janabi. The two remaining survivors of the family, al-Janabi's 9-year-old brother Ahmed and 11-year-old brother Mohammed, were at school during the massacre and orphaned by the event.
Five U.S. Army soldiers of the 502nd Infantry Regiment were charged with rape and murder: Specialist Paul E. Cortez (born December 1982), Specialist James P. Barker (born 1982), Private First Class Jesse V. Spielman (born 1985), Private First Class Bryan L. Howard, and Private First Class Steven Dale Green (2 May 1985 – 17 February 2014). Green was discharged from the U.S. Army for mental instability before the crimes were known by his command, whereas Cortez, Barker, and Spielman were tried by a military court martial, convicted, and sentenced to decades in prison. Green was tried and convicted in a U.S. civilian court and sentenced to life in prison. He committed suicide in early 2014.
Background
Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi (Arabic: عبير قاسم حمزة الجنابي ‘Abīr Qāssim Ḥamza al-Janābī; 19 August 1991 – 12 March 2006) lived with her mother and father (Fakhriya Taha Muhasen, 34, and Qassim Hamza Raheem, 45, respectively) and her three siblings: 6-year-old sister Hadeel, 9-year-old brother Ahmed, and 11-year-old brother Mohammed. Of modest means, Abeer's family lived in a rental one-bedroom house in the village of Yusufiyah, which lies west of the larger township of Al-Mahmudiyah, Iraq.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q252032. Authority coordinates are 33.067, 44.367. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2006, 1982, 1985 and 2014.
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