http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/bowe-bergdahl-faces-life-prison-6401555
Image: Pfc. Bowe Bergdahl, before his capture by the Taliban in Afghanistan
Bergdahl went missing from his post in Afghanistan on June 30, 2009. He was the only US service member known to be held captive there. Bergdahl was freed May 31, 2014 in exchange for five Taliban inmates held at the Guantanamo prison in a dramatic deal brokered by Qatar. U.S. Army via AFP – Getty Images file
UPDATE 14 DEC 15:
Bowe Bergdahl to Face Court-Martial on Desertion Charges
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.
DECEMBER 14, 2015
A top Army commander on Monday ordered that Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl face a court-martial on charges of desertion and endangering troops stemming from his decision to leave his outpost in 2009, a move that prompted a huge manhunt in the wilds of eastern Afghanistan and landed him in nearly five years of harsh Taliban captivity.
The decision by Gen. Robert B. Abrams, head of Army Forces Command at Fort Bragg, N.C., means that Sergeant Bergdahl, 29, faces a possible life sentence. That is a far more serious penalty than had been recommended by the Army’s investigating officer, who testified at the sergeant’s preliminary hearing in September that prison would be “inappropriate.”
According to Sergeant Bergdahl’s defense lawyers, the Army lawyer who presided over the preliminary hearing also recommended that he face neither jail time nor a punitive discharge and that he go before an intermediate tribunal known as a “special court-martial,” where the most severe penalty possible would be a year of confinement.
UPDATE
Added on 3:04 PM ET, Sun December 20, 2015
Bowe Bergdahl to be arraigned Tuesday (22 DEC 15)
http://www.cnn.com/videos/justice/2015/12/20/bowe-bergdahl-arraignment-preview-valencia-pkg.cnn