William Calley, the only American convicted for Vietnam war My Lai massacre, dead at 80

William Calley, a former US Army lieutenant convicted of war crimes in a Vietnam-era tragedy called the My Lai massacre, has died at age 80, according to media reports.

The Washington Post on Monday first reported Calley’s death, which happened in April, according to a death certificate the newspaper cited. The New York Times, citing Social Security Administration death records, also reported Calley’s death.

Neither outlet reported a cause of death. Calls to numbers listed for Calley’s son, William L. Calley III, were not returned.

In 1971, Calley became the only member of the US Army found guilty of war crimes over the My Lai massacre, one of the darkest chapters in US military history.

It occurred on March 16, 1968, when Calley’s brigade entered the village of My Lai based on faulty intelligence that enemy Viet Cong soldiers were disguised among the civilians there.

Calley, age 24 at the time, ordered soldiers to kill villagers even though they had found no evidence of enemy combatants.

The massacre involved the torture, rape and slaughter of hundreds of innocent Vietnamese.

The US Army covered up the events at My Lai for more than a year afterward.

The death toll of the massacre remains disputed, but US estimates place the number of dead between 347 and 504 unarmed civilians, most of whom were women, children or elderly men.

Calley was later the subject of a high-profile court martial, during which he said he had been following the orders of his superiors.

Although 12 other military officers were charged with crimes related to the massacre – including the subsequent cover-up – all were eventually acquitted of criminal charges.

Calley was ultimately convicted of murdering 22 non-combatants and was sentenced to hard labour for