new trial in March after a jury in Norfolk, Virginia couldn’t decide if they murdered two Afghan civilians last year. They may not have been able to persuade half the jurors, but both men have loyal followings on Facebook.

Parents of one of the contractors, Justin Cannon, looked on the bright side on their son’s Facebook support-group page: “As Justin said, he’s not been found guilty and it is my hope and prayer that in March, or perhaps before then, he will be found not guilty and freed.”

On May 5, 2009, the two contractors, Cannon and Christopher Drotleff (pictured), opened fire on a sedan traveling near their SUV on a Kabul road. The shooting injured the car’s driver, killed a man in the front passenger seat, and also killed a bystander walking his dog.

The facts in the case are in dispute. Lawyers for Cannon and Drotleff contended the contractors acted in self defense: the sedan clipped the front vehicle in their convoy and then turned and sped back toward them as they got out to help their comrades. Prosecutors claimed that’s all a cover story, charging that the Afghans car tried to leave the scene after the accident. The jury ultimately told Judge Robert G. Doumar this morning that it couldn’t come to a consensus on whether Cannon and Drotleff are murderers.

Both contractors have a fair amount of support online. Cannon, a former Army Ranger, has a dedicated website called the Ranger Defense Fund set up with a PayPal donation button to raise money for his legal expenses. It also hosts links to stories that portray Blackwater in a negative light, as the company fired Cannon and Drotlef shortly after the shooting. (His mom has also posted in our comment section.) A 2,923-member Facebook group for Cannon, seemingly an adjunct to Ranger Defense Fund, has posted updates from the trial.

Drotleff’s wife Gina set up a Facebook page to support her husband — 2966 members as of this afternoon — even posting his prison letters. “[B]ehind all this concrete and steel I feel more hopeless than I ever have,” he wrote on March 8. “But knowing that those people are out there and that you are praying for me and watching after my family at least makes the separation bearable.” In response to today’s mistrial news, a well-wisher active on both pages posted on the Drotleff-support group’s wall, “gina dont be sad maybe this good for them,dont be sad at all,i know its again a long trip,this destiny was for a reason [sic].”

There’s at least one other Facebook group devoted to supporting Cannon and Drotleff, but it doesn’t have a lot of activity on it.

Blackwater subsidiary Paravant, which employed the accused, has come under fire from the Senate for all manner of shadiness. An armed-services committee investigation reported in February that Paravant employees circumvented their lack of weapons authorization by signing out hundreds of guns from U.S. military depots under the name “Eric Cartman” — as in the authoriteh-obsessed fat kid from South Park. Chairman Carl Levin charged that Paravant is a shell company, set up just so Blackwater could win a contract from Raytheon with the military to train Afghan soldiers without all the negative publicity that comes from the controversial company’s name. Its employees often carried on drunkenly, the Senate inquiry found, even firing weapons under the influence — something Cannon has denied.

Lawyers for Cannon and Drotleff told Newport News Daily Press reporter Peter Dujardin that the jury deadlock is “unbelievably frustrating.” Their next chance at satisfaction comes in March.

Photo: Chris Drotleff’s Facebook support page

See Also:

• Blackwater in Kabul, or Eric Cartman Gets an AK-47
• ‘500 AK-47s, Please’: Art Imitates Blackwater
• The Blackwater-South Park Hearings: A Postscript
• Ain’t No Party Like a Blackwater Party, ‘Cause a Blackwater Party Got Coke, ‘Roids, and AKs
  

Authors: Spencer Ackerman

to know more click here