(Updates with sentence, details) By Marty Graham CAMP PENDLETON, Calif., Nov 21 (Reuters) - A U.S. Marine accused in the kidnap and murder of an Iraqi grandfather who was posed with a gun to look like an insurgent was sentenced to 21 months in custody on Tuesday after pleading guilty to lesser charges. Lance Cpl. Jerry Shumate, one of eight U.S. servicemen charged in the April 2006 shooting death of 52-year-old Hashim Ibrahim Awad in the Iraqi town of Hamdania, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and conspiracy to obstruct justice. Shumate's plea during a hearing at Camp Pendleton, California, came as part of an agreement with prosecutors that calls for the dismissal of more serious charges of murder, kidnapping and larceny in exchange for his testimony. Shumate, 21, became the fourth defendant to plead guilty to lesser charges in the case, and each was sentenced to between one year and 21 months in custody. Four others still face courts martial. They are accused of dragging Awad from his home, shooting him and covering up the crime by placing an assault rifle and a shovel next to his body to make it look like he was a roadside bomber. The shooting was one in a series of incidents in which the conduct of American troops in Iraq has hurt the U.S. image abroad. Other Camp Pendleton-based Marines are under investigation in a separate incident in November 2005 in which 24 civilians were killed in the Iraqi town of Haditha. Each of the defendants who has pleaded guilty has testified that the eight-man unit set out on April 26 to capture and kill a different Iraqi man, Saleh Gowad, who they described as an insurgent. At his plea hearing, Shumate said he wasn't aware that his comrades had grabbed the wrong man until it was too late. "At first I thought it was Gowad but later I found out it was Awad," he said. "We detained Gowad previously but he was released."
