A BRITISH ARMY captain has been convicted of the manslaughter of an Irish member of his regiment during a training exercise in 2012.
Captain Jonathan Price (32) was found guilty of manslaughter by gross negligence at the end of the seven-week-long courts martial of three officers regarding 21-year-old Michael Maguire’s death on a live shooting range in Pembrokeshire, south Wales, in May of that year.
Maguire was shot in the head after coming under machine gun fire during the training exercise. The three officers had organised the training drill.
They stood accused of having “a total disregard for the safety” of their men when they organised the live ammunition training exercise ahead of the unit’s deployment to Kenya.
Two other officers, Lieutenant Colonel Richard Bell (45) and Warrant Officer Stuart Pankhurst (40), were likewise found guilty at the hearing in Wiltshire today of negligently performing their duty with regard to the exercise.
The three men are expected to be sentenced on 24 July.
Cork man Maguire had been a member of the army ranger unit since 2010, and had been through one tour of duty in Afghanistan.
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