Posted on 10/13/2006 5:05:13 AM PDT by InvisibleChurch
OXFORD, England -- A coroner ruled Friday that U.S. forces unlawfully killed a British television journalist in the opening days of the Iraq war.
Deputy Coroner Andrew Walker said he would ask the attorney general to take steps to bring to justice those responsible for the death of Terry Lloyd, 50, a veteran reporter for the British television network ITN.
Witnesses testified during the weeklong inquest that Lloyd - who was driving with fellow ITN reporters from Kuwait toward Basra, Iraq - was shot in the back by Iraqi troops who overtook his car, then died after U.S. fire hit a civilian minivan being used as an ambulance and struck him in the head.
"Terry Lloyd died following a gunshot wound to the head. The evidence this bullet was fired by the Americans is overwhelming," Walker said. "There is no doubt that the minibus presented no threat to the American forces. There is no doubt it was an unlawful act of fire."
ITN cameraman Daniel Demoustier, the sole survivor of the incident, told the inquest that ITN's pair of four-wheel drive vehicles were overtaken by a truck carrying Iraqi forces and that gunfire erupted.
"The hell broke loose completely. I was absolutely sure I was going to die," Demoustier told the inquest. Driving blindly in smoke, Demoustier said he realized the passenger door was open and Lloyd was gone.
Demoustier, a Belgian, said he jumped from his flaming car and lay in the sand, waiting for the shooting to stop. Demoustier said he tried to stand to signal U.S. tanks in the area but that they resumed firing at the clearly marked ITN vehicles.
Demoustier said he saw a Red Crescent ambulance arrive and pick up people. He was later taken to safety in the car of a British newspaper reporter.
The coroner said Friday that a civilian drove up in a minivan, pulled a U-turn and picked up four wounded Iraqi soldiers, then saw Lloyd with a press card around his neck and helped him into the van. Lloyd was shot in the head as the van drove off toward a hospital, the coroner said.
Demoustier said after the ruling that the inquest had not made clear whether the bullet that killed Lloyd was fired by a U.S. tank or helicopter. He said the forces in a tank would have been able to see that they were firing at a civilian vehicle, but a helicopter would not.
The U.S. Embassy in London said it had no immediate reaction to the ruling.
Lloyd's widow, Lynn, in a statement read by her lawyer, said U.S. forces "allowed their soldiers to behave like trigger-happy cowboys in an area in which there were civilians traveling."
She called the killing a war crime - "a despicable, deliberate, vengeful act."
Lloyd and the three other ITN crew members were some of the few Western reporters who covered the fighting on their own, while most others were embedded with U.S. or British forces.
Lebanese interpreter Hussein Osman also was killed in the ITN crew, and cameraman Fred Nerac remains missing and presumed dead.
U.S. authorities didn't allow servicemen to testify at the inquest. Several submitted statements that the coroner ruled inadmissible.
The court watched a video Tuesday, filmed by a U.S. serviceman attached to one of the tanks accused of firing at the reporters' cars. The tape opens with images of Lloyd's vehicle and the Iraqi truck burning amid gunfire. The tanks drive to the cars and inspect them. A minivan - possibly the ambulance - appears and more shots are fired.
At the end of the tape, a U.S. soldier shouts, "It's some media personnel! That's media down there!"
A forensic examiner said the first 15 minutes of the tape may have been erased.
In Britain, inquests take place when a person dies violently, unexpectedly, or of unknown causes. In the case of an overseas death, the inquest is held in the first English jurisdiction where the body is returned.
No doubt? When the terrorists use civilian vehicles to transport and explode all the time?
vaudine
Not a marked ambulance? Just a minivan? Are our troops supposed to have X-Ray vision? Was the initial wound by the Iraqi's a potentially fatal one?
Them's the breaks in a war zone. No sympathy here.
Lets see, reporters in civilian cars that are picking up wounded Iraqi "soldiers" in a war zone. And they wonder what happened...
In the midle of a battle a bullet pierces an ambulance and hits someone....? They really think we have the time or inclination to track down every weapon fired in the battle and match bullets? Pound sand.
This coroners act is political and offensive.
First off the journalist is in teh middle of a firefight and he gets shot. Thats the risk.
Second of all the comments that the minibus posed no threat to american forces. WHo the hell is he to make that judgment was he there? No. SO he has no basis upon which to maike that claim. Furthermore, As I read that articel there were Iraqi soldiers in teh minivan..that makes it fair game. It was a WAR for crying out loud. This hand wringing over ever single death in a war is just ridiculous. I'm sick of it.
Actually, there's no doubt that Walker wasn't there...doesn't know what actually happened....is an ass clown....and that Lloyd shouldn't have been there.
Wow, that last part is a bit of a stretch for your average coroner.
Oh, so we are supposed to not shoot in a combat zone where our enemies are not in uniform and use civilian vehicles to attack us? Gimme a friggin break.
This reporter should have been in the rear with the gear where they all belong.
This is nuts. Friendly fire sometimes kills our own troops or troops of the coalition why does this idiot think that a journalist has some special kind of Karma that keeps them alive in a combat situation?
If this guy had stayed home with this wife instad of riding along in a war zone the trigger-happy cowboys wouldnt have gotten him.
Tell LLoyds widow she should have realised when he left home to go to a combat zone that he might not come back.
And this coroner is revealing this now? Politics???
You're right. It's a WAR ZONE, not a tea party. The Brits need to quit whining about things like this. It just makes them look stupid and weak.
There's the key. He was in a civilian van loaded with enemy soldiers and got shot as forces took out the vehicle. It wasn't a clearly marked ITN vehicle as the Cororner or the article's author omplies. the Iraqis are the ones who shot up that vehicle. Nope, a bull$hirt political claim.
If they fired every reporter who did that, there would only be a handful of reporters left on Earth.
Which, come to think of it, would be a good thing.
What are the chances that one of the wounded Iraqis, who had been trying to kill the newsmen earlier, didn't finish the job when they realised that they had him in the van with them?
Sounds like the first 15 minutes of "erased" tape are irrelevant. BTW- Do they teach "Media Initials 101 " in the military now? ITN? Iraqi Terrorist Network?
When did "the Brits" whine about this? Does this coroner represent the Brits?
Put it another way: does Murtha represent the Yanks?
Fifteen minutes that probably show a war going on. We can't have anyone see that.
Not the BBC (Britain be Communist), though. If it was, he should have been shouting "enemy forces neutralized".
The "reporter" chose sides, and made a bad choice.
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