The Army will award the Purple Heart to victims of the deadly 2009 shooting at Fort Hood in Texas, after Congress approved a measure expanding eligibility for the award.
Thirteen people were killed and over 30 were wounded in Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s attack. The victims and their families fought for years to receive the Purple Heart and its benefits but were denied because of a debate over whether the shooting met the legal requirement to be considered an act of terror.
“Now that Congress has changed the criteria, we believe there is sufficient reason to allow these men and women to be awarded and recognized with either the Purple Heart or, in the case of civilians, the Defense of Freedom Medal,” the Army secretary, John M. McHugh, said in a statement announcing the decision. “It’s an appropriate recognition of their service and sacrifice.”
Until Friday, officials referred to the shooting at the base as “workplace violence,” not terrorism.
“In essence, what we have now is a recognition from the Pentagon of what the whole world knew right away, that this was an act of terror,” said Neal Sher, a lawyer for dozens of the victims. “I consider this event to be a major victory. I think it finally puts to rest the insulting and disingenuous insinuation that this was an incident of workplace violence.”
Congress expanded the eligibility criteria for the Purple Heart in December with a provision in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2015. The law states that an event should be considered an attack by a foreign terrorist organization if the perpetrator “was in communication with the foreign terrorist organization before the attack” and “the attack was inspired or motivated by the foreign terrorist organization.” Previously, the law required a finding that the perpetrator was acting at the direction of a foreign terrorist organization.
After a review of the Fort Hood case and the changes in law, the Army said the attack met those requirements. Major Hasan had communicated with Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical American-born cleric who recruited for Al Qaeda in Yemen, before the attack. Afterward, Major Hasan told military investigators that the shooting was an attempt to protect Taliban leaders in Afghanistan from American soldiers.
Soldiers receiving the Purple Heart qualify for combat-related compensation upon retirement and are eligible for burial in Arlington National Cemetery.
Mr. Sher said the victims’ lawyers would also fight for the Army to give the awards not just to those killed and wounded, but to people who developed post-traumatic stress disorder after the attack.
Major Hasan was court-martialed and convicted in 2013 of 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder. He was sentenced to death and is incarcerated at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas while post-trial and appellate processes continue.
On Friday, one victim, Shawn Manning, said word of the award was “surreal.”
“It’s exciting to see the guys who died that day be recognized for what they did, which was dying for their country,” Mr. Manning said. A staff sergeant at the time of the attack, he was in a processing center preparing for his third deployment to Afghanistan when Major Hasan began shooting a few feet away. He was shot six times as he tried to hide behind a desk, and he still has two bullets lodged in his thigh and back.
Mr. Manning retired from the Army in 2012 for medical reasons and now works as a mental health counselor for the Army. “Daily I’m in a lot of pain,” he said. “There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about the shooting, or the people that died and everything that happened that day.”