Muslim Soldiers Arrested For Poisoning Food?

A bizarre story from Christian Broadcasting Network. Ambers is skeptical. Sense of Events:

CBN News blogger Erick Stakelbeck writes that "five Muslim soldiers at Fort Jackson in South Carolina were arrested just before Christmas. It is unclear whether the men are still in custody."

There is not a scintilla of credibility in this report

not least because Stakelbeck is evidently entirely ignorant of military investigation procedures. Accused soldiers are not kept in "custody." Fort Jackson does not have a jail, it has detention cells for very temporary detention of suspects. There is no bail system in the Army and it is unusual for accused soldiers not be be released back to their units, where their commander may place them on restricted movement and/or under watch 24/7.

Usually, there are arrangements with a local sheriff's office for custody of soldiers accused of violent felonies; someone charged with assault or murder, for example, is not someone you want to put back into his barracks room under strict orders not to flee or hurt anyone. But you have to be dreaming if you think that five presumably Muslim soldiers, accused of a murder conspiracy, and held in the Columbia jail, would not have been reported in the media long ago. Trust me, they ain't there.

As for Stakelbeck's claim that his information is from a "source with intimate knowledge of the investigation," that is similarly bogus. The only people who would have such knowledge are the CID agents, the post provost marshal, the post's commanding general and deputy CG, the post's chief of staff and probably the secretary of the general staff, CID's command chain and that's pretty much it. There may be another two or three officers, but only maybe. And I absolutely guarantee not one of these persons is breathing a word to Stakelbeck or any other reporter. That's what Mr. Grey is for, see above, and I'd even say that Fort Jackson's PAO is referring questions to him. (He works at CID's headquarters at Fort Belvoir, Va.)

It's important to note that the CID agents stationed at Fort Jackson do not work for the post's commanding general. They do not take orders from him regarding investigative matters. The post's CG has no authority either to initiate an investigation nor to truncate or end one.

A final note: I served with CID's Brig. Gen McGuire when we were both stationed at the Pentagon in the early 1990s.