Additional charges were possible, said Chris Grey, spokesman for the Army Criminal Investigation Command. It had not been decided whether to charge Hasan with the death of the unborn child of a pregnant soldier who died, officials said on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the case publicly.
Meanwhile, Obama ordered a review to determine whether all intelligence was properly shared and acted upon. John Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, will oversee the review. The first results are due Nov. 30. Obama also ordered the preservation of the intelligence.
Members of Congress are pressing for a full investigation to determine why Hasan was not detected and stopped. A Senate hearing on Hasan is scheduled for next week.
Representative Peter Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, and others have called for a full examination of what agencies knew about Hasan’s contacts with a radical imam and what they did with the information. Hoekstra confirmed this week that the US government knew of about 10 to 20 e-mails between Hasan and the imam, beginning in December 2008.
A joint terrorism task force overseen by the FBI learned late last year of Hasan’s repeated contact with a radical Muslim cleric who encouraged Muslims to kill US troops in Iraq. The FBI said the task force did not refer early information about Hasan to superiors because it concluded he was not linked to terrorism.
Hasan was charged in the hospital without his lawyers present, said John Galligan, his civilian lawyer.
“What I find disturbing is that my client is in ICU, and he’s 150 miles south of his defense counsel, and he’s being served with the charges,’’ Galligan said. “Given his status as a patient, I’m troubled by this procedure and that I’m not there. I’m in the dark, and that shouldn’t be the case. I am mad.’’
