Federal District Judge Ricardo Urbina has dismissed all charges against five guards from US security firm Blackwater over the killing of 17 Iraqis in Nisoor Square, Baghdad, in 2007. While the five Blackwater contractors and their parent firm (now renamed Xe Services) are undoubtedly relieved, the overall private security sector should refrain from cheering because this is not good news for them…Because the charges are being dismissed, on what will be widely viewed as a technicality, there will be no trial and thus the central issue, whether the Blackwater guards were innocent or guilty of killing unarmed civilians, will never be examined. This is not good news for an industry which is already, if mostly erroneously, widely viewed as being able to literally get away with murder.