Veronica Guerin

U.S. Journalist Shot to Death in Iraq

Wednesday August 3, 2005 9:46 PM
By ABBAS FAYADH
Associated Press Writer

BASRA, Iraq (AP) - An American freelance journalist, who accused Basra's police of being infiltrated by Shiite militiamen in a recent New York Times column and his Internet blog, was found shot to death in the southern city after being abducted by armed men driving a police car.

Steven Vincent, whose work also has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, and his female Iraqi translator were abducted at gunpoint by five men Tuesday evening as they left a currency exchange shop, police Lt. Col. Karim al-Zaidi said Wednesday.

Vincent's body was discovered Tuesday night on the side of the highway south of Basra. He had been shot in the head and body, al-Zaidi said.

[...]

In an opinion column published July 31 in the Times, Vincent wrote that Basra's police force had been heavily infiltrated by members of Shiite political groups, including those loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Vincent quoted an unidentified Iraqi police lieutenant as saying that some police were behind many of the assassinations of former Baath Party members that have taken place in Basra.

``He told me that there is even a sort of 'death car' - a white Toyota Mark II that glides through the city streets, carrying off-duty police officers in the pay of extremist religious groups to their next assignment,'' he wrote.

Vincent also was critical of the British military, which is responsible for security in Basra, for turning a blind eye to abuses of power by Shiite extremists in the city.

[...]

  Guardian article

Other journalists killed in Iraq.