Marine Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller Jr. is being released from confinement Tuesday, according to the Marine Corps.
Marine Capt. Sam Stephenson, Training and Education Command spokesperson, said:
Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller Jr. is being released from confinement today, Oct. 5, 2021, as a result of a mutual agreement between Lt. Col. Scheller, his Defense counsel, and the Commanding General, Training Command. No additional details regarding the agreement may be released at this time.
Scheller was confined last week after he allegedly violated a gag order from his commander to stop posting on social media about his case.
Scheller had criticized U.S. military leadership over the botched Afghanistan withdrawal in a short video posted on his Facebook page on August 26, after 13 service members were killed as part of the military’s non-combatant evacuation operation in Kabul.
A Taliban fighter stands guard at the site of the August 26 twin suicide bombs, which killed scores of people including 13 US troops, at Kabul airport on August 27, 2021. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images)
In his original video, he demanded public accountability from his senior leadership. He was fired from his command the next day and ordered to take a mental health assessment.
In a subsequent post, he announced he was resigning his commission, just a couple of years short of the 20 years that would earn him a military pension. He also continued to criticize a string of civilian and military leaders, including former President Donald Trump, but later walked back that criticism.
After his videos on the matter continued going viral, his superiors banned him from posting on social media. After he continued posting, he was put in the brig.
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The Marine Corps said he was in pre-trial confinement pending an Article 32 preliminary hearing.
His parents appeared on Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson Tonight on September 30. His father, Stu Scheller Sr. said on the show:
His crime was speaking truth to power, and power couldn’t handle it. I also said that while he broke chain of command, Austin, Milley, McKenzie, they broke the chain of trust and confidence in the American people. We’re mad, we’re mad as hell. And I’m asking the American people to find your voice. Stand up, demand accountability of your Congresspeople. Ask for Lieutenant Scheller to be freed. In my opinion, of course, I’m dad, so it’s probably not fair, but I think he should receive his pension after 17 years of fighting for this country. I think he and his family should have their health benefits and VA benefits for the rest of their lives for the sacrifices he’s made.
Scheller’s mother, Cathy Scheller, added, “He needs to be out of solitary confinement in prison, where he is not allowed to call anyone or to have visitors.”
Republican lawmakers and senators have also demanded that Scheller be released, raising it with top Pentagon leaders and writing letters to the Marine Corps commandant.
Award-winning war correspondent Lara Logan has also pushed for his release. On Fox News Primetime on October 2, she said generals responsible for the Afghanistan debacle are not taking responsibility, but jailing Scheller “for speaking the truth.”
“So, what they’re really doing is jailing him for speaking the truth. And I listened to the parents, and I want them to know and I want everyone in America to know that I stand 100% with their son,”
she said. “Because he did something that everyone in America has been waiting for for years,”
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