U.S. Contractor Fired On Iraqi Vehicles for Sport, Suit Alleges

Sheppard served in the Army from 1995 to 2002, including time as a Ranger, and was deployed in Albania and Kosovo. He worked in Iraq and Qatar for other private security companies and began working for Triple Canopy in April.

"These guys are tremendously experienced and well-respected in the field," Smith said. They assert that Triple Canopy has given other companies false reasons for firing them.

On July 8, according to their lawsuit, Schmidt and Sheppard were riding with their shift leader in a convoy to pick up a KBR employee at the Baghdad airport.

As their vehicle approached the airport, their shift leader declared that he was "going to kill someone today," the lawsuit states. The man then stepped out of the vehicle and fired several shots from his M4 rifle into the windshield of a stopped truck.

Schmidt and Sheppard were horrified, Smith said. According to the lawsuit, the shift leader told them, "That didn't happen, understand?"

After their convoy picked up the KBR employee, the crew headed to its next destination. At this point, Schmidt and Sheppard allege, their shift leader declared, "I've never shot anyone with my pistol before." The man then opened his door and fired seven or eight rounds into the windshield of a nearby taxi. Schmidt and Sheppard later heard that a cabdriver was found shot to death in the area, according to the suit.

Schmidt and Sheppard initially hesitated to report the two seemingly unprovoked shootings, especially because their supervisor told them that they would be fired if they did, their lawsuit claims. The men also feared for their safety, they said.

But the next day, the shift leader was returned to the United States at the end of his three-month contract, Smith said. The two men reported the shootings, were suspended, then were fired. Smith said Triple Canopy told them they were fired for not reporting the shootings quickly enough. Schmidt asserts that when he asked who was investigating the incidents, Triple Canopy told him no one was investigating.

Smith said she does not know how many people might have been wounded or killed in the shootings. She said that Schmidt and Sheppard could not see into the truck that was fired on but that they did see a cabdriver in the second vehicle.

Attempts to oversee American contractors in Iraq, including the thousands who have been hired to provide security, have "gone from completely absent to spotty," said Peter W. Singer, a specialist in warfare and the Middle East at the Brookings Institution. Most oversight is focused on how U.S. money is spent, Singer said. But as to the regulating of contractors' conduct, "that part of the discussion is pretty much missing still."