CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Federal prosecutors charged a veteran of the

The charges grew out of a military investigation involving up to five soldiers in the March rape and killing of the woman in Mahmoudiya and three of her relatives.

Prosecutors said Green and other soldiers entered the home of a family of Iraqi civilians, where he and others raped a member of the family before Green shot her and three of her relatives to death.

Green was arrested in recent days in North Carolina, two federal law enforcement officials said Monday. He is being held without bond pending a transfer to Louisville, Ky. Green had served with the 101st Airborne, based at Fort Campbell, Ky. It was unclear why Green had been discharged from the Army.

On Friday, the U.S. military acknowledged that Maj. Gen. James D. Thurman, commander of the 4th Infantry Division, had ordered a criminal investigation into the alleged slaying of a family of four in Mahmoudiya.

Four members of the 502nd Infantry Regiment have had their weapons taken away and were confined to a U.S. base near Mahmoudiya, officials said. If convicted of premeditated murder, the soldiers could receive a death sentence under U.S. military law.

The suspects belong to the same unit as two soldiers kidnapped and killed south of Baghdad last month, a military official said on condition of anonymity because the case was under way.

The military has said that one and possibly both of the slain soldiers were tortured and beheaded. The official said the mutilation of the slain soldiers stirred feelings of guilt and led at least one member of the platoon to reveal the rape-slaying on June 22.

One soldier was arrested after admitting his role in the alleged attack on the family, the official said. The official said the rape and killings appeared to have been a "crime of opportunity," noting that the soldiers had not been attacked by insurgents but had noticed the woman on previous patrols.

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MAHMUDIYA, Iraq (Reuters) - The Iraqi woman at the center of a rape-murder inquiry by the U.S. military was no more than 16 years old when she was killed along with her parents and young sister four months ago, the local mayor said on Monday

The attackers, who U.S. commanders now suspect may have been American soldiers manning a checkpoint near the family home outside the town of Mahmudiya, then burned the bodies to cover up the crime, mayor Muayyad Fadhil told Reuters in an interview.

"They were found killed and burned on the morning of March 12," Fadhil said, just after he met a U.S. military officer at his municipal office in the small town south of Baghdad.

Hospital director Dawood al-Taie said his morgue received four burned bodies that day and showed death certificates made out on March 13 for the four named as the victims by the mayor.

"Gunshot to the head and chest. Face unrecognizable due to burns," read the certificate for Abeer Qasim Hamza, who the mayor said was 16 when she died and had been raped.

Taie said he had no record that evidence of rape was found.

The military has given few details of a probe launched a week ago after two soldiers came forward with allegations.

Officers said on Friday they were investigating whether at least three soldiers had a role in raping a woman at Mahmudiya and killing her and three relatives including a child on March 12. Troops originally blamed the killings on guerrilla fighters.

Somewhat conflicting versions of events are now emerging from local people in an area dubbed the "triangle of death."

Most residents and officials agree the killings happened in a village some 7 km (4 miles) from Mahmudiya and say the family were Sunni Muslims from the powerful Janabi tribe. The precise names and ages of the dead vary among the accounts, however.

TABOO

The accusations of rape, a taboo subject among rural Iraqi Muslims, may have contributed to a reluctance to publicize the killings -- one family member refused to discuss the issue on Monday and few Iraqi media have given coverage to the case.

But it also makes the case explosive for public opinion, even after a string of other charges being brought against U.S. troops as commanders crack down on misconduct toward civilians.

The Sunni Muslim Clerics Association said on Sunday the Mahmudiya case revealed "the real, ugly face of America."

Fadhil acknowledged it was a "dangerous subject" and said he had met a local U.S. commander to help complete the inquiry, which the mayor said he had been told was "75 percent complete."

"If it's true then it was a barbaric act of revenge against an area they call a 'hot spot' (of insurgent activity)," town council leader Najim al-Qaraawi said.

Anxious not to create new enemies and to leave behind a friendly

Already tarnished by the

Last month, 12 troops were charged with murder in two other cases, more than doubling the number of such charges in the war.

The mayor named the dead as Abeer Qasim Hamza, 16, who was raped, her father Qasim Hamza Rasheed al-Janabi, 38, mother Fakhriya Tahir Mheysin, 30, and sister Hadeel Qasim Hamza, 10.

The death certificates shown briefly by the hospital were numbered 579 to 582. Other details on the forms were unclear.

A U.S. military official said U.S. documents put the rape victim's age at 20, he said. He would not confirm other details of the case but said he was not aware of another in the area.

The Washington Post put the daughters' ages at 15 and 7. It quoted neighbor Omar Janabi saying Abeer Qasim's mother told him on March 10 the young woman had complained about advances made toward her by U.S. soldiers at a nearby checkpoint.

Janabi told the paper he was among the first to arrive at the house after an attack on March 11. He said he found Abeer sprawled dead in a corner, her hair and a pillow next to her consumed by fire, and her dress pushed up to her neck.

The inquiry was launched after two soldiers from the 502nd Infantry Regiment came forward late last month. Two others are suspected of rape and one of these, since discharged from the army, is also suspected of the murders, officials said.

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